


we’ll sweep out the ashes in the morning

by letsperaltiago



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: AU, Affairs, Drama, Emotional Infidelity, F/M, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurts So Good, Reunion, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2020-08-20 20:28:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20233891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letsperaltiago/pseuds/letsperaltiago
Summary: Even in the middle of New York's freezing month of February, a scandalous familiar fire is ignited within Jake and Amy when they run into each other after years apart. Luckily there's nothing wrong with being caught up in a fire that has to die out soon, right?





	1. i didn't mean to start this fire and neither did you

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so I've been walking around with this idea in mind for quite a while now. Now I've finally gotten around to get it started! It'll be a 5-chapter thang, since I'm a loser who will lack the strength to get anywhere with a story if I have no tight limits and plans for the plot. 
> 
> This story takes place in an alternative universe, where Amy applied for and got the job as 'data analyst' for for Major Crimes (See episode 1.15: 'Operation Broken Feather' for further reference). This means that Jake and Amy no longer work together and havent for a few years. This also means that I don't know what right and technical job title this new job would get Amy, so I'm just going with/imagining that she was still a detective even after her transfer. 
> 
> Also, I know that Jake and Amy's characters would never actually hurt anyone like this (spoiler alert?), but damn it's for the story and drama. Let it hurt so good. Hope you like scandals and if not; you may leave. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think in a comment/kudos! 
> 
> xx

It really had been the best yet also most disastrous kind of accidental occurrence that day. Best back then, when Amy Santiago was promptly striding down the sidewalk on a just as coincidental cold, February morning. 

Her head was dipped in a downwards adjustment, simply enough for her to absorb the new information on her phone which had just led her to pick it up from the pocket of her navy blue coat just a few seconds ago. Out of what seemed to be nowhere, it all came to a halt. Maybe more a thud and burst actually, when suddenly her phone flew out of her hand in one direction meanwhile the still warm coffee in her other hand travelled in the opposite direction. It took her a much startled second to realise that herself, her coffee, phone and a stranger suddenly had one thing in common; they were thrown off their respective paths with quite the vivacity. All that her eyes managed to grasp in the few fatal seconds was a black coat covering a masculine figure and chestnut-like hair. The remaining details remained undefined in her state of shock. All she knew was that she’d ignorantly stumbled into someone.

“Oh my goodness, I am so so sorry, sir!” She exclaimed immediately after her brain had put all the facts together and suddenly felt the guilt of being just another typical phone-addict; she used to be so good at limiting the amount of attention she’d give it. “I was reading an email and wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.” She kneeled to pick up her phone from the icy sidewalk as well as the now empty cup (even an accident like this was no excuse to be a litterbug).

“Wow, Santiago. Who would’ve thought I’d ever experience you on your knees and calling me sir?”

As she was practically on her knees, the figure standing in front and above her allowed himself to speak; right then and there Amy Santiago could’ve sworn that she felt a scrap of familiarity rush through her body’s nervous system. The octave of the voice, deep enough for man’s but not enough to hide the manchild behind; Calling her Santiago? No one else would do that without a preceding ‘Sergeant’; the facility of the fall of the joke? Like it came from a place of practice and habit? It could only be… 

“Peralta?” In contrast to how her head had previously been tilted forwards and down, it was now tilted backwards to look up at the half-stranger and take in the indeed chestnut-like hair (still messy and curly), cinnamon eyes and surprisingly unsurprisingly mischievous smile.

“The one and only,” the chuckle was just as familiar as the rest of him. “Here,” he kneeled down to her level and started to pick up things she hadn’t even realised she’d dropped. “Let me help you out.” He started reaching out for her keys and lipstick that’d been resting safely (or so she thought) in her purse.

Meanwhile Amy was still kneeling but with her back now straightened in bewilderment whilst her eyes followed his every movement with the purpose of figuring out if he was actually real. For how long she did this exactly, she doesn’t recall, but next thing she knew he’d followed her example and straightened his back as well. Still on his knees and eyes directed at her whilst holding her stuff in his hands. Rushing people walking by, or rather around, the kneeling couple didn’t seem to give in to their New York-curiousness. It was 8 AM and everyone had places to go. Including Amy herself, she suddenly realised and snapped out of her until now absent state of mind.

“Oh, wow! Uhm- thank you,” she fumbled with her words and hands as she grabbed her things from him before hastily standing back up. Once both back on their feet it hit her that she was being suspiciously far-flung considering the fact that Jake Peralta was no stranger and had been looking at her with nothing but kind and inviting eyes ever since she took a first dive into them approximately 30 seconds ago. Her body’s response to this realisation was a swift shake of the head. “And oh my goodness- hi!” She stuttered overwhelmed and awkwardly (Santiago-stylez) in the act of finally smiling for the first time post collision.

“Hi,” the reply was followed by his figure instantly leaning in to hug her like he’d been holding it back since realising who he’d collided with. Of course she automatically let her arms wrap their way back around his broad shoulders, hating how completely right and practically overwhelmingly good it felt. Almost like something that’d been missing had made its way back home. This was only proved right by the fact that it almost,_ just almost_, made her heart drop when he pulled back.

“How are you doing? It’s been forever!” There was a swift switch in the direction of his gaze upon noticing a few drops of coffee on his coat, provoking him to quickly brush them off before redirecting his attention back to her. She could’ve sworn he’d fumbled just a bit too much in the process. Almost like he’d hoped that she hadn’t noticed him taking his eyes off of her for just a second. Attentive as always, she thought.

“I’m good! And yeah it has been a while, hasn’t it?..” she couldn’t help but notice that the present dread in her voice was on the edge of obvious. Ever since Amy had gotten the job and transferred to Major Crimes to be a data analysts (with the Vulture), she had barely to never seen Jake since. Sure, they’d texted a bit back and forth, sent the occasional joke or meme, but even this had died out once they’d gotten used to the other’s absence at work and each their new life-partner: Teddy and Sophia.

“I’m glad to hear that,” Jake smiled brightly and Amy could never doubt the fact that he fully meant it. “…And I’m sorry I haven’t texted or called. Life, yanno?” He shot a look down at his carefully shuffling feet.

“Hey,” an impulse within her, like an overwhelming craving, brought her left hand to reach out across the space between them to gently squeeze his arm. “No worries. I’ve also been super busy and haven’t reached out. We’re cool.” To her delight his shoulders dropped in a sign of relaxation, his eyes rose back to hers and everything seemed to be as it should be, when you run into someone you used to know so well and maybe even used to consider your best friend. Pleased with this she allowed her hand to drop from its spot on him.

“No wonder why you’re out here running into people then, Santiago,” they both had to laugh at the comment, relishing in the resurfacing of familiar banter that used to and once again lead Amy to push a lock of her dark, freely hanging hair behind her ear. This triggered a thought that couldn’t help but welcome into his mind: would she still wear her hair up in the famous pony-tail he still remembered? Or was this lose hair her new thing? Her hair was so much longer now. Gosh, he had so many questions.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I got an email from work and had to check it,” she bit her bottom lip nervously, briefly holding up her phone as emphasis of her explanation.

“Always so devoted to duty,” Jake could barely tell if he was smiling again or just hadn’t stopped since he realised who he’d bumped into. “Anyways… I’m sure you have tons of things to catch up on, like emails and whatnot…” They both chuckled nervously, dancing around the fact that they both logically needed to go but seemed to lack the will. “… So I’ll let you get to work, detec-“

“Sergeant, actually,” there was a sense of pride and authority behind her correcting. Both in her voice and eyes. Something Jake couldn’t deny suited her incredibly well.

“Of course,” he picked up his now corrected point with a cheesy smile. “Why doesn’t that surprise me? I always knew you’d outrank me…” Jake couldn’t entirely tell if it was because of the cold or if it was because she was flattered, but her cheeks definitely bloomed with a shade of pink; just a tiny bit and enough for him to notice. “Anyways, I will let you get to work then, _Sergeant…_” he made sure to emphasise her new title, which to his enjoyment and suddenly lightly racing heart earned him an even wider smile in return. “Bye then.”

“Bye, Jake,” she smiled, before stepping beside him and picking up where her path had been interrupted.

With each clack of her heeled boots, each sound of her walking away and out of his life again, Jake felt his heart race beneath his increasingly clenching chest. Not that this had to mean _anything_ specific, but it definitely brought along the manifestation of curiosity and the feeling of wanting to know more; he wanted to have a real conversation with her; he wanted to sit down and know her again… He felt his body push him to edge of actually asking which was oddly similar to wanting to throw up. There was nothing to lose or dangerous about catching up, right? They weren’t strangers, simply friends who’d drifted a part. Now was not the time to strive away from his otherwise so straightforward personality.

“Hey! Santiago!” He turned around on the spot, calling for her attention before she could get too far away and drown in New York’s sea of oh so important and busy people. Luckily she hadn’t been in a rush to get away from him and was simply a few feet away. “Would you like to catch up over a drink? Or crappy Chinese food?”

Hating how aware of his question he was, he was thrilled to see her smile at his last comment, resulting in the deflating of his question’s denseness.

“That…” She paused for a second, before realising that she was about to overthink it all which would mean giving the situation more meaning than actually needed. They were old colleagues, for Christ’s sake! Catching up was normal. Not weird. Not meaningful. Just… normal. Besides that there was this muted, constant thumping in her chest and gut. Somehow it was telling her that saying no would be betraying herself more than anything or anyone else. He had been her friend before, so it made sense that he hypothetically could become it again. “That would be nice, Peralta. Let’s do that. You still have my number right?”

Almost like he’d been holding his breath in anticipation (which he hadn’t ‘cause this was just Amy; Amy his old partner and friend), Jake breathed out a reply. “Yes! Awesome uh-I’ll text you!”

Her smile was accompanied by an approving nod, before she turned back away from him to continue her already twice interrupted journey to work. Apparently Amy Santiago still provoked his blabber mouth; two interruptions wouldn’t let her go without a third. “Or I’ll send an email since you’re apparently so absorbed by those these days.” His half-yelled comment fought its way through the noisy crowd and earned him the impeccable sight of Amy Santiago doing a quick 360 mid-stride, only to send him an iconic eye roll and ‘annoyed but it’s funny’-smile. It all happened so fast, yet in slow motion if you’d asked Jake, and before he knew it Amy continued straight ahead like nothing had happened. Jake could’ve almost (just almost!) sworn to God that he’d never seen anything more thrilling and satisfying than those three seconds that it took her to do that.

She hadn’t changed, had she? And neither had they, had they?


	2. i say we don't know what comes 'cause that's on the way

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're new here: welcome! And if you're returning for second chapter: bless you :')
> 
> Here's to some Peraltiago banter and pining !!

“I’m home,” Jake called out as per routine as soon as he set a foot inside the walls of his home as the clock stroke 8 PM. The winter darkness had swallowed New York whole multiple hours ago, and the dwelling feeling of this specific day being that longest in a while was stuck in Jake’s tired, cold bones. Yes, today had felt torturously long, but it wasn’t because of the dark season (a national depression and whatnot) or the fact that he’d been out the door for 12 hours by now. No, all day long it’d felt like his phone and hands were constantly burning in what was clearly a move with the intention of provoking him. His body wanted to text Amy so bad; the faster he did that, the sooner he’d (hopefully) get to see her again. Yet he managed to refrain from doing so, figuring that Amy Santiago wouldn’t give anyone or anything but her job the time of day during official work hours. 

Next thing he knew and before his thoughts could carry him elsewhere, the sound of a few light steps approached from the living room. Meanwhile he shrugged off his coat to abandon it on its designated hanger; right next to hers and above the already kicked off shoes.

“Hey,” he heard a warm voice welcome his eyes to switch in the direction of its owner. Here they met a pair of beautiful, welcoming brown irises. Not Amy’s warm brown irises though, he caught himself thinking… This was so wrong.

Immediately upon realising the betrayal his mind had just presented to him, Jake Peralta felt his heart skip a beat - the guilty kind - along with his gut dropping. It was indeed very wrong (even a rule he’d say) to compare ones current girlfriend, who was currently leaning against the doorframe connecting the living room to the entree, to an old friend slash colleague. Especially when you’d only talked to said old colleague for 3 minutes the very same morning. Her leaning hip elegantly as ever nudged the rest of her figure out of her resting position with his direction as target. “How was your day? It’s kinda late and I was getting worried about you.” Slender hands slid onto his waist as if they were making their way back home, reminding Jake of the fact that there was indeed nothing to worry about. Not when the incredibly stunning and smart Sophia Perez was gripping onto his knitted sweater in order to keep him in place for a welcoming kiss to his purple, frozen lips.

“Sorry,” barely made it out against her lips. Pulling away was his next move. “I had a perp that didn’t exactly feel like confessing, so I had to stay in order to get him to talk. He was _not_ a fan.”

“Always the hero, huh?” Sophia smiled cheekily before turning back around prior to walking back to whatever she’d been doing before he walked in. “I had to bring home an important case that’s due tomorrow, so I’m working on that and already ate… But I made sure to keep a portion of dinner for you. It’s ready to be put in the microwave.” Then she disappeared back into the living room.

“Thank you,” was all there was left for him to call out after her, before making his way to their kitchen. ‘_Their_ kitchen’ was still such a weird concept to Jake; sure they’d been together for 4 years now and had lived together for almost two, but sharing his home with another person still seemed surreal to him. This was of course nothing personal against Sophia, but it’d taken Jake a while to get comfortable enough with the idea of sharing a home with a romantic partner - hence why it’d taken Sophia two years to convince him of the fact that his apartment was a hazardous climate and that sharing the bills in two would ease their respective economies. All that aside, they now shared a quite nice apartment not too far from the 99th precinct and once again there was actual food on the table instead of his usual ‘chocolate milk with whatever cereal was in his cupboard that day’-combo. Not that he expected Sophia to cook or do anything for him… It was more a case of Sophia not really letting him, because she was afraid of him messing up, which to Jake himself seemed to be a fair judgement of character. What a chaos it would’ve been if he’d ended up with someone who couldn’t cook.

Whilst waiting for his food to be heated by the microwave as it quietly purred in the background, Jake suddenly realised he’d actually managed to forget about the burning phone in his pocket. For approximately three minutes. Nice. Without any further hesitation he grabbed the device from the right front pocket of his jeans andswiped it open before immediately clicking the green ‘contacts’ button; dear God, he hoped he still had her number. If not, he’d probably kill- _Oh_ _wait_, there it was. Jake instantly felt his heart settle again. Yet just as quickly as it had settled, his veins started pumping and of course his heart followed behind, racing again just as his shaky thumb clicked her name then ‘send message’.

Elsewhere, still in her old apartment, Amy Santiago heard her phone give off a rumbling sound that was too loud to ignore. A sigh escaped her otherwise relaxed body in frustration caused by the fact that she’d forgotten to take her phone off vibrate. Trying to fight the global phone-addiction, she liked her evenings undisturbed and preferably without unnecessary use of any gadgets. Though she had to admit that this interruption was no one else but her own fault; and Jake Peralta’s, she mentally added shortly after having put down her book and pushed herself off the couch to check on whoever was trying to reach her after 8 PM. A small, some would say guilty even, grin let its presence be known at the sight before her. Of course it was him; who else?

**Jake Peralta:  
** _Didnt have ur email saved in my contacts. Sorry:(_

Creative, funny enough for her to breath out a chuckle. Even though it was just a few words, Amy had to admit that she was pleasantly surprised by how unquestionably their dynamic fell back into place; something she’d lacked ever since her transfer.

**Amy Santiago:  
** _I’ll let it slide this one time. _

Waiting, staring at the three taunting dots, holding her breath.

**Jake Peralta:  
** _cool cool cool. so i was thinkin saturday. shaw’s. 8 pm. cool?_

Jake’s lack of upper case letters was a mess, which could only cause Amy to feel physically uncomfortable. She was just about to allow herself to comment on it; had he not gone to school? Though she refrained and thus it was quickly replaced by more important matters such as verifying her neatly structured calendar. It would be a lie though, if she claimed to not have made a mental note; Jake really needed to step up his texting game and formal requirements. Simply the thought of his supposed, messy work mails caused yet another shudder, whilst her fingers directed the conversation in a completely different direction.

**Amy Santiago:  
** _Just checked my calendar and we’re in the clear. Saturday at 8 it is. Hope you’ve gotten better at pool. _

In his comfortable spot on his and Sophia’s couch as yet another episode of _Queer Eye _introduced itself, Jake tried to act if he wasn’t actually afraid of not getting a reply; as if he didn’t fear the fact that Amy had agreed to meet up just to be polite and get rid of him that very same morning. He tried to act as if that would be okay ‘cause it’s not like they meant more to each other than the average old friend slash colleague. People came and went; Jake knew that better than anyone. Though that didn’t mean that he was actually good at playing it off as okay - especially when ‘people’ could potentially be Amy Santiago. Mercifully, a buzz coming from the arm rest beside him drew his attention away from the warm dinner before him and spiralling thoughts. There was no questioning the fact that he did indeed reach for the buzzing device way too fast, but all that fell aside when the lock screen’s preview of the text caused his heart to swell with joy.

**Jake Peralta:  
** _deal. and dont worry. i’ve been practicing. ur ass will be whooped by 9 _

A feeling of a potential catastrophe came rushing through his entire body as soon as his finger had pressed the ‘send’ button. Perhaps your third text in five years to an old friend shouldn’t include her ass; especially when you own ass was far from single and definitely had felt… emotions towards said old friend at some point in time. Fumbling fingers quickly typed out a desperate, probably pointless, redeem before yet again hitting ‘send’.

**Jake Peralta:  
** _sorry!! that was really inappropriate! _

“Fuck,” he furiously locked his phone, mad at himself, at the exact same time as the back of his head hit the back of his couch in defeat. Well, if she had no reason to back out before, she definitely had now. Billions of minutes went by (or so it felt) before another buzz drew the heavy head off the back of the couch in a quick snap. In a spur of moment it all very much felt like the pivotal moment of his entire life.

**Amy Santiago:  
** _Title of your sex tape?_

Oxygen once again poured right into his lungs, allowing his chest to open up and his breath to unhinge from the brief, horrid intermission. The widest smile in forever (compared to what, he didn’t exactly know) formed on his tired yet now very content face. Their relationship really hadn’t changed and apparently the student had become the teacher.

Though ‘Saturday at 8 PM’ had seemed lightyears away on that Wednesday, for both Jake and Amy, the weekend and day finally emerged. Unbeknownst to the opposite party, one was more nervous and excited than the other. They’d sent each other a few texts during those few days; small jokes, remarks and other whatnots without importance. Little did they know that every single notification made the other’s heart jump to their throats for just a nanosecond - every damn time.

**Amy Santiago:  
** _I’m at Shaw’s. Got us two seats in the right corner booth. Where are you? _

**Jake Peralta:  
** _its only 7.48!.. whatever. shouldve known i never had a fighting chance. see ya in 10_

Amy chuckled to herself after leaving her phone face down on the oh so familiar, wooden table. Seemingly out of nowhere, the strong familiarity of the situation hit her like a ton of bricks: Sitting in a booth at Shaw’s, the smoke from multiple lit cigarettes mixed with the smell of alcohol, waiting for an iconically late Jake, sipping on a cheap beer… If she hadn’t known any better, Amy could’ve sworn that she was back in 2014. There was no way she’d ever say it out loud, because that would mean actually acknowledging it, but she sometimes wished she actually was back in 2014. This would imply still working at the Nine-Nine and more importantly the fact that she’d get a second chance at choosing a different path for herself. A path that didn’t bring her away from what she’d forever consider her favourite work place and best friends; more precisely a path that didn’t bring her so far away from the possibility of getting closer to a certain idiot, sweet manchild. Sometimes she even caught herself redhanded thinking, daydreaming about what they could’ve possibly resulted in if she’d just stayed. If only she’d just stuck around long enough for her to realise that Teddy wasn’t a match and Jake possibly was… If not perfect then maybe at least _better_.

She must’ve been staring at the tip of her beer bottle for quite some time seeing that as soon as she allowed her eyes to leave it, she gazed right at a smiling Jake Peralta. Almost like he’d walked right out of her guilty daydream.

“7.59,” he briefly threw a glance at his phone, before putting it down on the table. “Nailed it.”

There was that stupid, racing heartbeat again, Amy thought to herself in the midst of trying to play it off with a welcoming smile and what she hoped was a smooth answer. “I’m impressed. Just for that? First drink is on me.” She pushed a second beer, unopened, in his direction. Prepared as always.

“First drink? Damn, Santiago,” he slid himself into the narrow booth and seated himself next to her. “Are you planning on getting me drunk?”

“Shut up.” Honestly? Yes. But she couldn’t admit to that so she settled for a classic eye roll. That at least always seemed to get her out of these kinds of situations, where she hopelessly needed to run from her secret wishes.

“Here’s to reunions and old friendships,” Jake raised his beer into the air, implicitly asking Amy to make this their little moment.

“I’ll drink to that,” Amy complied, clinking her bottle against his before taking a slurp.

Moving forward, flow of the conversation was smooth and seemed infinite. As a surprise to no one, they had a lot to catch up on and there was no sparing of details or sidetracks. The rabbit hole that was their five years apart was wide agape, and with alcohol added to the mix, there was no stopping them. Their phones never left their screen down positions on the table before them, and their eyes never left the other’s. This was continuously the case until they were both three drinks in and Jake’s phone suddenly pinged.

“Sorry. Just a sec,” the beer in his hand was replaced by his phone. “Must be Sophia asking where I am.”

_Sophia_. Amy mentally repeated the name, analysing it, trying to put it into a fitting context but alas failed. It must’ve shown on her face. She was never good at hiding her true emotions - especially confusion, where her frowning brows would always act as snitches.

“Oh, wait…” an almost regretful, nervous even, expression presented itself on Jake’s face. “You don’t know Sophia, right?” Why did he have a culpable feeling of not wanting her to either? Things were going so well. It might not have been morally right if so, but Jake couldn’t help but consider that an evening without mentioning Sophia would’ve been easier… He knew things with Amy could never head in certain directions, but he also knew that there would’ve been nothing illegal about forgetting about certain things for just a couple of hours, right? Temporarily allowing himself to forget that Amy had left, eliminating alternative fates for their relationship, thus leading him onto a path right into Sophia’s arms. Alas, it too late. There was no way around it, and Jake had to act like he didn’t absolutely loath the cards that were now clearly on the table. “I met Sophia about a year after you transferred to Major Crimes. She’s…” Jake interrupted himself by taking a finishing gulp of his now empty beer. “She’s great. We live together in an apartment near the Nine-Nine and we’re enga- she’s uh-… my fiancée.”

If he didn’t know any better, Jake could’ve sworn that his old friend’s otherwise golden brown eyes were suddenly eclipsed b a darker shade that he couldn’t quite recognise. All he knew was that it could compare to the way sinister thunderclouds would overtake a clear spring day.

“Oh, that’s…” He saw her struggle to form words, her dark eyes returning to the old habit of centralising on inanimate objects rather than people, whenever she needed a second to form her upcoming sentence. “That’s… amazing!” her eyes were redirected back to his, paired with a weirdly contrasting smile. “I’m so happy for you, Jake. You deserve that.”

If it wasn’t because he consciously forced himself to not overanalyse every single thing she said or did that evening, Jake would’ve been worried by this immediate switch of mood. Yet he let it be, acting as if everything was as it should be. “Thank you.” That was a start, Jake thought. “Yeah, I’m… very happy.” He begged to God that he sounded more convincing than he felt. Why was he feeling like this? He was far from unhappy with Sophia and there was no justifying his opposing thoughts nor his feelings.

“Good. That’s the most important, right?”

God, he hated that he loved the way she tilted her head, whenever she would ask a rhetorical question. “Of course… But uh- what about you? Got a lucky guy?” Though he was definitely tipsy by then, he was nowhere near drunk enough for this conversation. Just the fact that he felt the need to be drunk for this particular conversation was reason enough to get drunk.

“No,” she smiled. Not sadly, because Amy Santiago surely didn’t _need_ a man. But maybe her smile was _just_ unaccented _enough_ to imply that she needed _something_. This alone gave Jake a devilish and false sense of consolation. False in the sense that it was _so_ wrong. On the other hand he also suddenly feel the need to figure out what this _something_ was. “It’s just me, myself and my job,” she added.

“Well,” a comforting smile countered hers. The last thing he wanted was for her to interpret his question as criticising or demeaning. On the contrary, he actually admired (and _always_ had) her professional drive and independence. “That’s not a bad thing. I’ll have you know…” He pushed himself out of booth for the first time since he’d arrived two hours prior, earning himself a confused look frown from Amy. “… I’ll drink to you and your admirable devotion to your job. Beer?”

Amy couldn’t point out if it was caused by the change in the way the lamp’s warm light hit him now that he was standing up; or if it was caused by him taking off his hoodie before throwing it where he’d been sitting, only to reveal his iconic and flattering flannel; or if it was caused by the buzz in her head and heating cheeks that made her wish he would peel of the remaining layers of clothing. Whatever it was, Amy Santiago was frustrated, yet happy - that collision of feelings itself was extra frustrating. She needed to fight it off the deeply wrong and forbidden thoughts with something. “Shots?”

“Shots.” He concluded, checking for his wallet. “Definitely.”

When Jake came back with four tiny glasses of some clear liquid. Amy didn’t recognise that nor the taste, when she downed her first shot seconds later with Jake back by her side. They’d gulped down one each, followed by Jake explaining her what it was, but she didn’t care at this point. All she wanted was to get back on track and forget the pre-shots conversation about the future Mrs. Peralta.


	3. we opened up a cold case love and it got the best of us

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is! Chapter 3 and damn that was intense to write. Not only did I completely disappear into a dark hole writing this (hence the 5k chapter), but there was also such a wide range of feelings in this which was both interesting and challenging to write. I hope I did it justice and it doesn't come off as a chaotic mess! Please let me know what you thought and I hope you enjoy! 
> 
> xx

Before the shot, time had seemed to come to a standstill - the good kind, where the other’s presence swallowed the concept of time. Sipping on beer, catching up on each other’s most basic life-updates and simply joking around was enough for the sand in the hour glass to stay stuck for just a little while. It was all so simple, corny even, yet there was nowhere else in the world they’d rather wanted to be; right there at Shaw’s in each other’s company seemed stupidly perfect. Henceforth the mysterious shot also happened to get its deed done, making sure that the conversation’s flow from earlier was back and even better than before. 

“So,” Amy breathed out heavily, planting her elbow on the table (just an inch or two closer to him for good measure) allowing her chin to rest on top of her clenched fist. Her eyes were still that tad darker shade like earlier, though it was now for completely different reasons that were suddenly flourishing within her. “Are you going to whoop my ass tonight or what?” A cock of her left eyebrow emphasised the frisky mood and playfulness of the question.

On the opposite side of the invisible unspoken between them, the one right on front of Amy’s elbow that neither of them dare to cross out of respect though they wanted to, a suddenly rather dumbfounded Jake felt a lump of nervousness mixed with yearning jamming his throat. “Uhh,” the slight o-shape of his mouthwas enough to ignite a fire in her; whether she felt like admitting it or not, Jake Peralta’s attention definitely satisfied a mysterious drought within her. There was no escaping her profound stare, her delicately glazed eyes, provoking him to shift in his seat to make up for the lack of things to say.

“It’s now or never, Peralta,” it appeared to be her turn to push herself out of the cornered booth. Said action left a still very much speechless Jake by himself to stare at her undeniably beautiful figure as she rose to her feet for the first time that night, heedlessly aggravating the situation seeing that she looked _really nice _in an outfit that without warning appeared to be his new favourite. Turns out Amy Santiago, without any effort whatsoever, could make heeled black boots, mid-washed skinny jeans and a burgundy collared button-up shirt (that hugged her body all the right places) look like the centuries most impeccable outfit.

“Jake?” the calling of his own name snapped him out of his brief trance-like absence. Even though he’d been mindlessly staring at her during said brief mental absence, his gaze had without a doubt not been focusing on her face. The sound of her voice lead to a quick redirecting of his eyes, letting them stumble upon her face to meet glowing eyes as well as a provoking smile and slightly flushed cheeks. Said attributes were framed by her wavy and all too memorable dark hair falling effortlessly nonetheless flawlessly down her shoulders only to come to a stop right across her chest. Was it bad that his hands, unaware of time and place, wanted to run his fingers through it, furthermore getting his fingers all tangled up? Maybe so tangled up that he could never let her walk away again.

“Are you okay?”

Shit. For how long had he just been sitting there staring at her without saying anything?

“Oh uh- yes. Sorry. Probably just the buzz from the alcohol messing with me… You were saying?”

Luckily and to his great relief, Amy didn’t really seem to question him vanishing for a few seconds; that or she simply chose to ignore it. Either way he was good to go. 

“I was saying that if you wanted to do some,” she briefly paused in order to raise her arms and form air quotes with her fingers, “_ass-whooping_, then the pool table is finally available.” Figuring that her intentions were implied, Amy turned on her heels before he could reply.

Ah, yes. That kind of _whooping her ass… _Figurative speech_. _It was as clear as day that she was using his own choice of words against him yet somehow he’d still manage to misunderstand it in the spur of the moment. Now was probably a good time to snap out of it, follow her to the pool table and act like he hadn’t just sat there, dazed and misinterpreting her words for the past two minutes; the second shot of mystery alcohol was quickly downed without further reconsidering before Jake pushed himself out the booth to join his friend at the vacant pool table. 

To both his immense and so-so intoxicated pleasure but also rational misery, of course she was leaning over the green surface of the table in order to grab the scattered balls that hadn’t been put back in place by the previous players. With fresh intoxicants shooting through his blood, feeling his heart pumping with unruly and imprecise fluctuations, Jake paced himself closer to her stretched out figure reaching for the black 8-ball. There was no doubt in his mind; exactly this, the sight of Amy Santiago stretched out across a surface with no clue of how tauntingly the slight arch in her back enhanced the curves of her body, was a picture whose beguiled effect he’d never be able to repress. Not only for the rest of the night but also, if his brain hated him just enough, in future wandering thoughts. It was inevitable when such a beautiful picture had been presented to him.

To Jake’s relief, and after what seemed like just a bit too long for him to stay sane, Amy finally reached the black ball and pushed herself back off the table in order to put it in its designated spot with the rest of the balls. “Ready to lose?” She turned her head just enough for him to pick up on a smug smile.

“Only if you are, because that’s what I know you’re going to do,” Jake countered, going with whatever flow was building up between them again, her back on display now that she was grabbing cue sticks for them to play with; one in each hand, held by her soft hands’ firm grip that could only inflame more suggestive content for his wandering imagination.

“In your dreams, Peralta…”

Her eyes taunted him, but not obviously; more playfully, subtly as Amy Santiago would never admit to dancing with the devil though something about her dark eyes told him that she was in it to win it.Everything going on inside his head distracted him from paying any attention to the shaft of the wooden cue stick being transferring from her grip to his. Only when her fingers swiftly brushed against his did Jake actually pay attention to the fact that he know held the object in his hands and (hypothetically) was ready to play. Meanwhile Amy had already pranced off to the far end of the table where she got into position; lightly bent over, arms resting on the edge of the table. If Jake hadn’t entirely snapped out of his daze, he did when her first shot resulted in the triangle of coloured balls shattering, sending each and everyone of them in a new direction. It was with satisfaction and a content look on her face that Amy straightened back up and pushed her hair out of her face in the midst of it all.

“Wow, that was almost not horrible,” he teased, feeling the need to bug her; there was something about her that made it impossible for him to hold back on his words.

“Shut up,” she growled, almost throwing him off guard as she pushed his shoulder with her own as she passed him with their booth as her final destination. “I’m going to down this last weird shot of yours and then you’ll be a dead man.”

And so she did. While Jake bent over the table to take a shot at the shuffled balls, he discreetly watched her snap her head back and knock down the last shot; anything she did that night was stupidly hypnotising. If Jake had had just one more drink, then maybe he would’ve forgotten to actually play and it would’ve resulted in him just standing there bent over a pool table in a half empty bar, absorbing his friend’s every move. Luckily he hadn’t; he was past tipsy but definitely not _entirely_ drunk. Looking back down at the green fabric, feeling the cue stick in his hand was just enough for him to focus on something else than her and strike the ball before him. This was going to be a long game…

Closely eyeing each other at all times, both for competing and other unspoken reasons which presumably came from a brewing mixture of unresolved emotions, alcohol and curiousness inside their veins, Jake and Amy rhythmically followed the fate of their competition. Throughout the entire game they took turns trying to either obtain or keep the lead, which didn’t take place without a recognisable banter that reminded them of old times. Somewhere in between Jake constantly bumping into Amy on purpose, earning himself a precious laugh accompanied by a playful punch, and Amy managing to shoot one of her balls into a hole, they both agreed on getting another round of drinks. This decision was taken as if Amy wasn’t already constantly stumbling upon her own feet every time she had to stand still in order to take aim. Every time she did so Jake would lett out an intoxicated laugh. Even considering these circumstances the giddy woman still stumbled back to the pool table with a beer in each hand along with her mouth wide agape around a shot glass.

“Need help, _loserago_?” Jake chuckled as he came to her rescue, grabbing the shot glass from in between her teeth before tipping his head back and emptying its content into his throat.

With an expression similar to the one he’d portrayed earlier, Amy’s mouth was now wide agape in bafflement. “Hey! That was mine!” Almost like a child whose candy had just been taken from her, the woman wailed in disapproval. 

“As if I didn’t see you take a shot by yourself at the bar before coming back here,” Jake accused her, his eyes small in a caricatured squint that let her know that she’d been caught in the act. It wasn’t to say if she’d suddenly forgotten about the shot that he’d taken from her, but she definitely wasn’t pleased with being caught taking an extra shot. It was almost too easy to tell from the now defensive facial expression and arms crossed in front of her chest.

“So what? I can drink two shots if I want to.”

“Not when you already had two like… twenty minutes ago plus what? Three beers?” The testifying was accompanied by a presumptuous cock of the right eyebrow and a smirk before he redirected his gaze and nodded his head in the direction of the beers in her hands. “Plus this one.”

“Are you keeping count, Peralta?” She slurred, just enough to let him know that she was definitely drunk but not enough for him to worry - not that he actually had any right to be the judge of that since he himself had the warm, happy and slightly absentminded sensation of alcohol putting a rose-colored filter on everything and everyone around him.

“Maybe…” He shrugged, smiling culpably as if didn’t matter. “… and so what?”

Somewhere deep within her, Amy was pleased to hear him confess so. It meant that he was paying attention to her and better yet, it also gave her yet another reason to tease him. “Damn, you’re obsessed with me. I mean-“ she took a step closer to him with gloat in her eyes and smile, trying to come off as demeaning but rather goading him to move in closer as well. One stop closer. Not more, not less.“I already knew that you were like… definitely deeply,” she paused to let out a subtle hick-up, “-in love with me, but…” She continued her conquest, giggling with drunken amusement.

_Impossible_, he though as he dramatically tipped his head back and rolled his eyes. It had to be impossible to be this taunting, especially when he had no right to act on it. “Okay okay, Santiago. No more alcohol for you.”

Exactly as she was about to uncross her arms and take a sip of the already opened beer in her left hand, Jake grabbed both bottles from her. Instead of taking a sip herself, it took Amy a second to register what was happening and understanding that it was now her friend’s lips, instead of hers, wrapped around the head of the bottle.

“Give it back!”

“Nope,” he laughed before turning on his heels, jogging back to the opposite pool table to have it function as protection. “No more alcohol for you tonight.”

“G-give me my beer back. I’m doing f-fone,” she growled before setting off to chase him on her wobbly legs, reminding Jake of Bambi’s first time on the ice.

“Well as long as you’re _fone _then sure, I’ll let you drink…” Sarcasm had always been his favourite language, and Amy could only wonder why it stirred something within her every time he took advantage of a moment to show it off.He rounded the closest corner of the table as soon as she made her way to his side. Exactly how a 5-year old would start a game of tag, the woman wasn’t allowed within a few feet of him at all times. Guess he still was a man-child even after these five years apart.

“Jake!” It was almost a shriek at this point, clearly out of annoyance but also of secret affection. All Amy could do was jog after him; round and around the pool table as a mashup of shrieks, laughs and grunts filled the air. Both of them were getting tired though there was doubt about who was the most out of shape.

“Aha!” After having rounded the entirety of the table multiple times, Amy finally caught up with an out of breath Jake allowing her to steal a bottle from where his hands (and therefor the beers) were placed on the green fabric with the intentions of taking some his heaving body’s weight off his legs.

“The winner takes it all!” She sang the iconic line before boosting herself to sit on the pool table, barely making it as her arms (in her current rather drunk state, that is) could barely carry her. Nonetheless she was now safely perched on top, her legs dangling off the side and there was nothing else for her to do but celebrate with a long swig from the bottle.

“Ames,” he let out in a breathy giggle, feeling the shot he stole from her colliding with everything else he’d been previously drinking. “Stop it.”

“Make me,” and that was where she made her first mistake. If there was something Jake Peralta would _never_ step down from, it was a challenge - especially a challenge given by her. His mind was attuned to win, at all costs, and so he intuitively reached out to grab her right above her knee, when she in an attempt to flee was about to jump off the table.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he let out in a growl that faded into a snicker as he pushed down, enough to keep her in place but not enough to hurt her, on her leg. Even taking himself by surprise considering his previous lack of breath, Jake rapidly placed himself before her, stumbling into the space between her legs and recited the action on her other leg with his other hand. With both legs now pinned down by his strong hands gripping onto the area right above her knees, realising that his upper body was blocking her escape route before her, Amy tried to lean back onto the table in a last attempt to escape from the opposite long side of the table. Alas it was without effect; before she could even lean all the way down and attempt to roll out of his grip, his hands slid up her legs to slide his index fingers into the belt loops of her jeans instead. In a quick snap, in which there was no way either of them had time to think it through properly, Jake had pulled her back up. Making up for the space she’d created between them by actually managing to move slightly away from him,he overcompensated by pulling her back even further towards him, leading her to place har palms against her chest for balancing purposes. With no possible control over her body at this point, too caught up in the sudden intimacy, she unconsciously gave in to whatever he did. His repositioning of her body, so close to his, reminded her of a screaming kettle signalling that the boiling point was reached. However neither seemed to take the broad hint of the metaphorical kettle. Contrary to all moral, which had unwittingly been thrown out the window just about three drinks ago, Amy’s breath hitched when she finally allowed herself to breathe out, intoxicating her friend even further in the process and evoking an accidental flinch of his fingers by which she was reminded of his grip on her. Strangely, then yet again not at all, she never wanted him to let go.

She’d always wondered how people’s eyes could grow darker from certain influences but now, seeing that she was closer to him than ever before with the tip of his nose just few inches from hers, she finally understood. Never, now that she was staring into his, had she seen eyes with such dilated pupils. Even though she was caught up in the way his stare bore right into hers, she still picked up on the hitch in his breath when she breathed out yet again, gaining her lips his eyes’s full attention. For just a moment she speculated; did he wonder what her lips felt and tasted like, just like she did about his? Either he did or it was purely an act of impulse, either way his fingers slipped out of the belt loops, causing a feeling of disappointment to sneak in on her only to be interrupted by his hands sliding back to pull her in even close by the small of her back. Just as impulsively as he’d pulled, Amy allowed it by arching her back to finally unite their eager lips. it was momentarily unbelievable. Having always been pining for each other at the wrong time, similar to how the sun and moon would always miss each other, the world around them disappeared into a black hole - not that there were that many people around this close to closing-time. Either way, it was just them and the feeling of their lips exploring each other for the first time, completely ignoring the hesitance a first kiss would usually display and instead quickly getting used to the feeling and sound of their clacking teeth as they got in to the ways of their caving, quivering lips.

Jake wasn’t even sure whether or not there was any more room left between them, but nonetheless he tried to pull her in even closer, feeling his heart flutter at the sound of a muffled glitch in the breathing. He was too caught up in savouring her lips and therefor oblivious to the fact that his pelvis was in fact already pushed up against her crotch; there was no more distance between them to erase. In the meantime Amy had felt her body tremble and given in to the fact that G_od_ _yes_, she wanted him as close to her as physically possible. Even though almost unable to she’d still managed to vacate her hands from their spot on his chest, nails lightly scratching his sensitive skin in the process of moving them up his neck where they found home in his messy curls.

“Has your-“ she managed to breathe out between clashes “-hair always been this-“ she was once again interrupted though this time by his teeth tugging on her bottom lip, prompting the type of tiny whiny moan that he’d secretly been dying to hear. “-curly?”

After leaving his teeth slightly sunk into her lip for another few seconds, earning him the verbal reaction he was desperately chasing and dying to hear, he let go and breathed thickly against the corner of her lips, “For the past two years or so.” The last word just barely made it out, swallowed by him going back to kissing her. The dance between their lips quickly evolved into nibbling that would soon reveal itself in the shape of tiny love bites, covering the entire space from her lips; to her neck; to the hidden spot beneath her ear which occasionally included tugging on the ear lobe which in return would earn him a what he quickly considered a beautiful compilations of _oh_s and _ah_s. He then placed a peck to the shell of her ear, “You just weren’t around to see it.”

As good as to stop her from answering he returned to kissing her lips, feeling slightly agitated from the memory of what felt like her abandoning him five years ago.

“Oh, please…” Her breath was warm against his face, slender fingers tangling themselves in the most prominent of his curls before lightly, just enough for it to shoot through his entire nervous system, pulling on them. “You never wanted me to just see-“ a bite to her neck, the hardest one so far, cut her off. “_Shit_, Jake,” she hissed partly from pain, partly from pleasure. Though she couldn’t witness it herself, a very pleased smile grew on her partner’s lips. There was something about being able to make her squirm and react the way she just did that drove him absolutely mad. Never had he ever consumed drugs, but he couldn’t help but compare this moment to a high. He suddenly didn’t mind being addicted…

There was no way for either of them to recall _how_ or even _when_ they’d left the warm interiors of the bar. All that Amy knew was that she definitely felt ice cold bricks, probably ones belonging to a wall in a dark alley, pressed against her back. More likely was it that _she_ was pressed up against the brick wall, sandwiched between that and Jake’s figure. Their current location made just as much sense as what they were doing, but then again they obviously hadn’t worried much about the whole kissing-thing so why worry about the alley?

A cold rain had been drizzling from the sky ever since they set a foot outside, causing Jake’s messy curls to fall flat against his forehead. Every once in a while, either caused by movement or simply the time it took for a drop to slide all the way down, their fighting lips would hitch at the sensation of an icy driblet of winter rain. Sometimes it’d miss their attached lips and instead explode on her hands that held onto the collar of his coat as if it were her lifeline. Unexplainably so, though Amy suspected that it’d never actually been closed, her jacket was wide open. This, more than anything else, welcomed Jake to reach for the burgundy dress shirt only to bury his hands under it in the hunt of two things: her and heat. Needless to say that he found both, plus a bit more, when he felt her body shudder beneath his cold hands.“Sorry,” he mumbled lazily, slowing down the pace of his kisses before redirecting them towards an area that was yet to be fully discovered.

“It’s o-okay,” her voice trembled from a mixture of cold and the overwhelming feeling of being touched for the first time in what seemed like forever. All these caresses and feelings were only in addition to it finally being by the right pair of hands and lips, which meant more than anything else.

“You’re-“ Jake murmured deeply against her cheek as his cold fingers picked at the soft, warm skin of her stomach before removing them to fiddle with the bottom button of her shirt, “-amazing.”

His fingers, though controlled by his buzzed brain, quickly managed to pop open the button; the pattern quickly repeated itself and before Amy could object, this considering she didn’t actually _want_ to, Jake pulled the now two fragments of burgundy fabric apart to reveal the ultimate motive. Before him reigned the sight of her soft curves of her stomach and waist, looking just as he’d dreamed of many times before. The smooth narrowing of her waist lead his gaze up to what, in that specific moment, was without a doubt the world’s most beautiful pair of breast. Held by a lacy yet elegant black bra, he could see just enough to know that Amy was perfect. 

It wasn’t news to either of them that whatever they were doing took a lot of breathing and therefor resulted in many huffs and puffs. Yet seeing Amy’s almost bare chest heave in an almost violent, exasperated constant up-and-down pattern was something Jake would never forget. He did that; he could make her body react like this. In the midst of simply taking it all in, Amy allowed herself to pull him in an attempt to win some control by nibbling at his neck as her hands were messily searching for whatever part of him that would provide her the most warmth. 

“Don’t stop,” she pleaded in-between the contact between skin and lips, resulting in herself being denied the badly needed access to his neck when he slid his hands into her hair, tugged back her head and kissed her lips once before travelling downwards to repeat the action on her exposed collarbone. The warmth of his lips in contrast to her icy skin earned him the sound of a hiss of pleasure. Following touch of his lips pressed to the middle of her throat before the next took a deep plunge to land right above her cleavage.

“_Fuck_,” she cursed when he took another chance by nibbling at the top of her left breast, redirecting her hand to the back of his neck to hold him in place; screw hiding from the cold February rain. She could feel goosebumps all over her body; from top to toe, there was no denying that she was indeed giving up every sense of concern about her own health. Some would probably say that it was stupid; it probably really was, but on the other hand there was no such thing as considering anything twice when Jake Peralta was making you feel _everything _you’d never felt before in a dark alley at two in the morning. 

“I’ve missed you so much,” he managed to breathe out in between kisses travelling from the brand new hickey on her left breast back to her by now very swollen, pink lips. Normally Amy had a no hickey-policy, although tonight there was nothing she wanted more than for Jake to paint her entire body with warm kisses, scratching teeth and imprinting hands.

“I know,” she breathed back, taking in how sweet not only his lips tasted but also his words. Her hand that had previously held onto his hair swiftly slipped down to cup his face as to hold it close like she was hanging on for dear life, which she to some extent actually was; he made her feel so alive.

“Wish this could last forever,” was mumbled against the sensitive shell of her ear before pecking it as if nothing had been said, casually travelling down to leave new bites to her delicious skin. Alas…Whereas the cold had been possible to ignore because of the heat she felt from the rush and _him_ alone was distracting enough, a bucket of ice suddenly seemed to drop upon her - literally and metaphorically. Literally because she was pretty sure the rain had evolved to tiny snowflakes because of the dropping temperature; metaphorically because_ this couldn’t last forever. _Jake was engaged; she was currently hooking up with someone else’s husband-to-be.

It wasn’t exactly news to her, but whether she’d spend the night consciously repressing it or simply had forgotten in the heat of it all, Amy was sure of one thing; it was _very_ wrong.

“Jake,” she panicked, feeling her heart pick up a bad kind of irrational pace. Never before had she sobered up so fast. Jake on the other hand continuously stained her neck, simply letting out a hum of acknowledgement. “We need- we need to stop.” Her hands involuntarily dropped from her before desperate grip on his face, down to his shoulder in an attempt to push him off of her. As soon as his brain had combined her words with the physical resistance, Jake drew back to stand up straight, looking at her with glazed eyes and bruised lips. Lips that she had bruised, she couldn’t help but think as she took in the sight before her.

“Are you okay?” He was clearly worried about her sudden snap, though still lightly dazed from both alcohol and the sudden lack of touch.

Deep down she knew, she was even sure of the fact, that he wasn’t a bad guy; he’d rather die than cause her any pain. But looking at his current state suddenly stung as it now symbolised the infidelity and cruelty she’d brought upon his life. Poor Sophia was probably at home, trusting that the love of her life was just out having a drink and a good time, meanwhile he was actually making out with his ex-partner in one of Brooklyn’s many dark alleys.

“I’m-,” an icy breeze reminded her of her open shirt, reminding her to immediately wrap the fabric back around her to both keep her warm but also hide the parts of her body that he should never had gotten access to. “I’m so sorry, Jake. I-“ words struggled to form in her mouth, her chest heaving from the rising anxiety and inability to breath properly. How could one talk her way out of _this_?

“Ames, d-don’t be. It’s not your-“ he started to plead, slowly sobering up and trying to save her from the guilt that was already eating her alive. The fact was though that it was hopeless; Amy was determined to get out of there as fast as possible. The sooner he was out of sight, the sooner she could work on moving on and make sure no one else ever found out about this tragedy. The last thing he saw was a drop of water sliding down her cheek, making him wonder whether it was a tear or the remains of what used to be a snowflace. Before he could get an answer, or even just get to ask, she was running away into the night.

“Amy!” he yelled desperately, shocked to an extent that kept his feet from moving, furiously running his hands through his wet hair in anger and frustration. Was he mad because he’d cheated on his future wife aka. the person who he was supposed to vow his life and love to? Or was he mad, because he’d cheated on his future wife aka. the person who he was supposed to vow his life and love to, when actually he wanted to give all that to someone else? All in all:

W_hat the fuck _had he done?


	4. can’t remember to forget you

With every single pulsing heartbeat and ticking of the clock, the world kept spinning and time went by without further intertwining of two specific, lost souls. The cold, nail-biting winter slowly and tortuously transitioned into spring. Somewhere in Brooklyn Amy’s eyes unconsciously flickered to the calendar hanging on her kitchen wall, which would tell her that the day was indeed May 14th, involuntarily bringing her to think of the fact that Jake and Sophia were throwing their much anticipated Spring-wedding (not her words) soon… More precisely this weekend… Even more specifically May 16th — or so Rosa, who happened to be invited, had told her over drinks a few weeks ago. Just like her friendship with Jake had faded after her job transfer, Amy and Rosa rarely saw each other these days, but once in a while they'd make sure to catch up over drinks and the occasional comfortable silence (compromise). The memory of Rosa breaking the news to her over drinks still stood out vividly, even weeks down the road. 

_“You coming to Peralta’s wedding? Do you guys even talk anymore?” Rosa had thrown into space, catching Amy off guard by initiating the end of what had happened to be a renowned comfortable silence, which for the past minutes had managed to only get slightly interrupted by the discreet sound of Amy sipping on her beer bringing her about to put it down with a thud against the wooden bar. _

_No, she wasn’t invited - no wonder why - but also couldn’t help but be overpowered by guilty curiosity. Ever since that malefic evening they’d spent together, Amy had obsessively wondered whether or not Jake had told Sophia about it - or anyone, for that matter. it was a fact that Rosa was one of Jake’s closest friend thus, although Rosa was a very private person, Jake could’ve opened up and told his friend about the evening he spent with their third, common friend. Alas, she hated admitting to it and probably never would out loud, there was a tiny part of her that hoped that maybe some day a text or a phone call would confess to her that they should be together; that said malefic evening wasn’t a slip-up but on the contrary an epiphany. Well, perhaps an ‘epiphany’ wasn’t the right choice of word since their act was a rather immoral act of selfishness on both their parts. Perhaps ‘revelation’ had a less religious undertone and was therefore probably more appropriate for this particular sticky situation. “Oh- uhm… When is it? And, I mean, we talked a few weeks ago, but that’s… about it,” she trailed off before looking down into her bear in attempt to try and hide the fact that the latter was a lie. _

_“I don’t know,” Rosa shrugged nonchalantly. “May 16th or something. I threw out the invite as soon as I saw the terribly cheesy engagement picture of the two of them that they’ve used for it.” _

_Though it didn’t really surprise Amy that her friend reacted the way she did, it was undoubtedly Rosa Diaz that she was talking to, a frown and crinkling of the nose only seemed appropriate. “Was it that bad? And what are you going to do then? Just show up on a random date?” _

_“Sure,” an iconic shrug of the shoulders from her friend let the curious woman know that she didn’t care much and was going to do like she always did - and probably nail it with her cool attitude anyways. Rosa took another sip as a natural break from talking before picking back up the conversation. “I know I can’t run from the fact that I actually-” she took a pause as to brace herself for what she was going to say before continuing with a look of discomfort, “…care about Jake. Like, he’s my friend…” _

_A small smile crept onto Amy’s face. Every tiny glimpse into Rosa’s secret soft side felt like a huge moment to celebrate. Yet Amy knew better than to point out said glimpse; this would only provoke her already calloused friend to share even fewer details and secret sensitivities. Instead Amy bit her lip and let her friend continue with wherever the, surprisingly, personal conversation was going._

_“… But honestly I don’t care much for Sophie. Never really liked her… Or maybe I just don’t like her for Jake. I can’t really tell.”_

_“Sophia?” Amy corrected meanwhile Rosa tried to recover from the emotion in what she’d just said by downing the remaining of her drink and smoothly ordering a replacement. _

_“Whatever, sure. Anyways I’m only going for Jake’s sake.” _

_“That’s…” Frist Amy tried to grasp, secondly put together, the somewhat ground breaking information she’d just been given. Meanwhile her friend had unsuspected knowledge of all the speculating and whirlwind of emotion she’d just opened the way for. The third stage of dealing with these informations consisted of figuring out whether or not what she felt was actually… bad? Evil? Was she a horrible person for feeling just a tiny bit less worse about what happened between her and Jake solely based on the fact that one of Jake’s closest friend (and therefor a legitimate source!) didn’t like Sophia? _

_“That’s…Too bad. But at least you’re going. I’m sure he’ll be very happy to see you there,” Amy finished her sentence, just barely making up for her sudden, suspiciously uncharacteristic reticence by raising her almost empty beer suggestively. _

_“To Jake?”_

_Having definitely picked up on some way too obsessively curious indications and not Amy-like behaviour, Rosa shot her friend an uncertain glare before deciding on not diving into whatever was haunting her friend. Today had already contained too many emotions for her liking. _

_“To Jake,” Rosa raised her refill. _

The conversation about Jake and Sophia had come to its end at that moment but Amy’s worries, hopes and speculations sure hadn’t. They had since then haunted her day-to-day life making it impossible to go on as if she didn’t feel the ghost of Jake Peralta’s lips haunting her skin, in the form of burning spots on her neck, every time she passed Shaw’s or made her way through the 99th precincts’ neighbourhood. Impossible had never been a word in Amy Santiago’s dictionary; yet here she was with the troubled feeling of losing control of herself, defeated over and over again by the image of his hungry, alcohol-infused eyes ransacking her lips and chest for the first time. A tiny part of her wanted to believe Jake Peralta was a horrible person. A horrible person because he cheated on his fiancée with some old colleague he hadn’t seen for years who just so happened to be there at the right time and place; some old colleague who happened to be there when he was drunk, causing him to feel scandalously unrestrained. Yet there was no denying the fact that branding him as a horrible person would be unbelievable wrong and hypocritical. Amy herself wasn’t much better at all. She was said old colleague; she had kissed Jake Peralta without denying him it when he complied. If Jake was a horrible person then so was she and maybe that was something she wasn’t quite ready to admit to yet - or ever. 

The daylight of an otherwise ordinary May-day gradually dissolved into familiar darkness reminding Amy of kisses in drizzling, frozen rain and dark Brooklyn-alleys. Similar to how a pressuring countdown could drive the most sane person insane, her own equivalent of a ticking bomb was counting down to detonate on May 16th. A partnership of letter and numbers on the white, clean pages of the calendar which hung above her organised nightstand burned in the pitch black of her bedroom. Beneath it, on the nightstand itself, a digital display of numbers glowing in the dark let her know what time it was; for how long she hadn’t been able to sleep and instead had spent tossing and turning like a woman possessed by the devil. 

2 : 54 AM. 

“Damnit,” her body’s180 flip to rest on her opposite shoulder, facing away from the clock and calendar in protest, was alas in vain. The date and number still burned in her mind as if she’d never turned over at all. Buzzing through every working vein, fiber and cell in her restless body was the anxious feeling of losing and it was making it impossible for her to sleep let alone unwind from the her constantly, both mentally and physically, jittery state.It hadn’t always been like this. The first few days after their adventurous evening had definitely left her in jitters and a constant state of confusion as well, though it was nothing compared to the horrid nauseating feeling of time running out. To make it even worse it had only started growing faster and stronger, totally destroying its previously somewhat balanced curve, as soon as her calendar had displayed the month of May. 

There was nothing more frustrating than the feeling of losing something wasn’t even hers to lose. From the depth of the dark night her phone then chimed loudly, immediately interrupting the chaos inside her head with wonders about who would be calling during this horrifically time of night. She flipped back to her other side in order to grab the phone on her nightstand; no sane person would call her in the middle of the night if it wasn’t an emergency, right? So she told herself as she blindly reached out for the screaming device.

“Hello?” She mumbled tiredly, repressing a yawn in the back of her hand. 

“Amy?” Resonated from the other end of the line. 

And somehow the sound of her name had the ability to freeze her in her spot in the darkness of her bedroom, more helpless than she liked feeling. And it was all because of a phone call that she’d anticipated for so long yet now wanted to run from so bad she could feel adrenaline pump furiously through her entire system. 

“Ames?” A stroke of pulsing energy rushed down her spine upon hearing the distant yet so familiar nickname moulded by the sound of his annoyingly perfect voice. Was it because it sounded good or simply because it belonged to him, she wondered. 

“ Are you there?” Jake tried once more to catch her attention, unbeknownst of the fact that he already had it but that she simply couldn’t seem to push the words she tried to form across the edge of her lips. By accident, her eyes panned across the digital clock on her nightstand just as the last number increased to 2 : 55 and subconsciously prompted her to utter the bare minimal. 

“Y-yes,” she’d left her lying position to instead sit up in the queen sized bed, using her free arm to hold her knees to her chest as to have something, just the bare minimal, to keep it occupied and away from gripping her already messy hair.

“It’s me… Jake.”

Of course it was. There was no point in trying to deny the fact that Amy had recognised his voice right away. Even in a crowd of a million people she’d be able to pick up on it. Yet, as if him actually coming forward with an introduction, committing to the crime of calling her in the middle of the night before his wedding, her heart suddenly ceased to beat for him. There was no telling whether it was caused by the fact that being called as such an ungodly time of the night was just unpleasant in genereal, or if it was because of the unjust, perplex comfort his voice brought her, when the hard truth was that she could never have him. Yet one thing was definite: something within Amy clicked, catalysing an entire range of unpleasant emotions. 

“You’re not supposed to call me,” she expressed cooly, completely ignoring the previous feeling of yearning for his attention and outreach. 

On the other end of the line a hitch in Jake’s breathing declared inquietude on his part, obviously feeling thrown off by his ex-partner’s hostility. 

“I-“ another hitch. “I know-“

“No,” she cut him off; all mercy had been thrown out the window moments ago. “You _don’t_ know, Jake. If you did know you wouldn’t be calling me right now.” 

“Why are you attacking me like this? You make it sound like all of this is only _my_ fault?” His voice climbed to a scolding tone, which was new to Amy who’d only ever known Jake as the incredibly goofy, immature yet only good-hearted person. Even after the course of multiple years of partnership, he’d never been anywhere near raising his voice at her. “I’m the one with a fiancée; I’m the one who’s bound to hurt the person I’m supposed to promise to love forever.” 

“What do you want me to say?” The tone of her voice followed his progressively aggressive lead feeling provoked by where the conversation seemed to be heading. “That it’s _my_ fault that _you_ ended up cheating on _your_ future wife?” 

“Wha- No! That’s not what I’m saying, Amy!” How come it had to sting every time he said her name out loud, she couldn’t help but wonder in the midst of these crumbling grounds. “I just want you to hear me out and not dismiss me like I’m the bad guy here.” 

“Why?” she spat on the verge of tears stemming from the frustration of concealing her true feelings which’d shattered all across the floor the second she tasted his lips that wet, cold night. Amy would never back down; she would never let him, or anyone else for that matter, tell her that this was her fault alone. Although just the implicit accusation was enough to exasperate her. 

“Because,” he paused letting a pregnant silence take over for just a brief moment, enough for him to collect his thoughts and fall back down to a composed tone. “I can’t stand the thought of you hating me. You’re somehow too important to me and-I’m all alone right now and suddenly all these thoughts came rushing in, questioning- ” 

For just a second Amy considered giving into his suddenly apologetic tone; to give in to the infatuated butterflies in her belly which wanted nothing more than to feed off the sound of his voice confessing to feeling something too. Maybe not love but perhaps just something more than innocent friendship or unmanageable lust they’d expressed so far. Though contrary to what she wanted, without warning, Amy’s sense of control bursted at the seams. 

“I- I can’t deal with this. It’s too messy and just… You don’t get to say that, Jake!” The tears that had now formed in her eyes, the ones that threatened to spill, started to show through her thick voice as she fought with everything within her. What did she fight for or against exactly? She wasn’t even sure anymore which only seemed to be amplifying. 

“Amy, let me speak out, please,” he plead though his voice had gained back a certain touch of confidence, the firm tone she knew he possessed when needed. 

“Why should I? Jake, you’re getting married in what is _literally_ a matter of hours. You shouldn’t have anything to tell me. You shouldn’t be questioning _anything_ on the night of before your wedding.” In strong contrast to her previous outburst, perhaps one that had woken up her neighbours, Amy’s voice now faded into a thick silence. For just a few yet long seconds, Jake was tricked into thinking she’d interrupted the call nonetheless he continued, praying to whatever stronger force hat she was still there, listening. 

“That’s it! I shouldn’t be, I know, but I’m suddenly questioning everything!” All sense of confidence was sucked out of his body and replaced with trembling doubt that reflected in the way he spoke with a quivering pronouncing of every word that slipped off his lips in an anxious rush. “Am I where I’m supposed to be? Am I with who I’m supposed to be with? My entire life suddenly seems to be flashing before my eyes, making me rethink every defining moment I’ve ever encountered - even the ones I didn’t realise were that important back then, like… Should I’ve let someone like you slip away and out of my life? Am I a fool for marrying a women that to begin with didn’t believe in our relationship? Should I’ve followed my instincts and chased you instead? Where would we be now if I’d just-“ 

Fully ignited yet so very worn down. Nothing else seemed to describe her better at that very precise moment. After having lived in what could be defined as a constant state of emergency for the past three months, a state where she could only dream of hearing him say those words but never telling him simply because it would allow him to hurt her, she wanted to give in to what he was hinting at. Alas Amy Santiago didn’t have a life calendar for no reason; her life was and would always be well-considered and meticulously planned which meant that Jake Peralta was far from suiting. 

“Amy, ever since that night together my life has been like… one big question and,” a shaky breath let her know that he’d been holding it. “I don’t know what the answer is anymore.” 

She bit her lip, squeezing her eyes together in both frustration and fight against the tears. “This- This is too much… “ If only he knew what she actually wanted tell him. Something along the lines of how he should’ve followed his instinct back then. And although he hadn’t, she’d allow this very moment, even though it was morally wrong, to be their ‘now or never’ if he wanted it to be. 

However Amy Santiago had never been the one to take such huge risks. The counterarguments seemed to be piling up in her mind; not only did she risk ruining herself but also someone else’s life. Alas a risk she couldn’t offer anyone. 

“You shouldn’t be calling me.” 

Though he wasn’t physically present to see it, the thought of Amy with a facial expression that matched the sound of her broken voice tore Jake’s heart into pieces. Her voice suddenly, after all the rage and fierceness, seemed wrecked, shaky and at the very edge of perishing.

“Ames…” He tried to soften up the tense moment as it seemed to slipping through his fingers. 

“I hope,” she took a deep breath, a sob threatening to ruin her already collapsing facade. “I hope you have the most beautiful day of your life with Sophia. Don’t let anyone take that away from you - especially not me. We’re cool, Jake… I just can’t get further into this right now or… ever. But we’re cool, okay? Don’t worry about it. Goodbye.”

“Don’t say that-“

The line was cut off leaving him with nothing but the sound of a monotone beep. 

In an suddenly very empty-feeling bed in Brooklyn, though he’d never actually lied there with her, sat a crumbling Amy who’d just barely managed to hang up before bursting into tears and disappointment. Across the water of the East River, somewhere in lower Manhattan, Jake sat speechless by the landline in some random hotel room, where he’d been situated as to follow the tradition of not seeing his future wife before they stood by the altar to promise each other a life of love and commitment. To his right, hanging on the outside of the wooden wardrobe, was a freshly washed and pressed tuxedo full of the said promises. The promises he suddenly doubted so strongly. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long to update, but life has been hella stressful and busy lately! I will try to get the next chapter out faster. Thank you for reading! Please let me know what you think: comments and kudos are always oh so very appreciated!


	5. you've got your demons and she's got her regrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am SO sorry for completely neglecting this story and taking a lifetime to update. I'd actually finished writing this chapter a few weeks ago already but forgot about it because of school and uh life. Then, when I wanted to work on a new chapter today, I saw that I'd already written an unpublished chapter and only needed to edit! And so here you go!
> 
> Also: The story was originally gonna be 5 chapters but for the sake of not rushing things, forcing the remains of the plot into this one chapter, I will prolong it with 1 or 2 chapters - depends on how I decide to let it come down from this chapter's 'outcome'. Hope no one wants to object to that ;) 
> 
> Enjoy and please let me know what you think! 
> 
> xx

So that was it.

Amy stood by her kitchen counter staring out her window feeling like a void of disbelief following the night’s climatic turnout: To no one’s surprise she hadn’t gotten any proper sleep that night instead opening it twisting and turning. And now, in the early morning hours, she was left to fight with herself wondering if what she’d said and done was actually what the situation, in it’s entirety and not just last night, deserved.

_Yes, it definitely was _or so she stubbornly kept telling herself through the nagging feeling of the situation and the thought of what Rosa had said about Sophia, something she couldn’t seem to let go, which clouded her ability to think clearly: What if Jake wasn’t _actually_ happy with Sophia? But then again, if the case was so, she still had no right to meddle. Jake had still been unfaithful to someone who _obviously_ loves him and there was no way Amy could ever make a fair case out of that fact and her own wicked actions night at Shaw’s.

Her eyes travelled away from the sight of Brooklyn unfolding behind her window to the silver watch on her wrist: it was well over 9 AM already, and though it was in fact her weekly day off her gloomy mood wasn’t going to be used as an excuse to dawdle. No, today was going to be productive even if she was feeling sad; even if, within the next few hours, Jake Peralta would be married, legally united with someone else. 

Though agonising the picture was painted clearly in her mind.Her mind wandering off was a recurrent occurrence these days…

_By the end of a beautifully decorated aisle surrounded by family and the people he cherishes the most, he will stand, tall, proud, handsome For once he will unremarkably put together, in his fitted tux with a huge, happy smile on his face: the kind of genuine toothy smiles that causes his brown eyes to shine along. Meanwhile he will be thinking about how beautiful his future wife looks in white on her father’s arm as they make their way towards him and how they, together till death tear them apart, are about to write a new chapter…_

… A chapter in which Amy couldn’t help but yearn to take Sophia’s part in even though she knew very well that there was no way it could, and their actually shouldn’t be, so. Amy herself was a slip-up, meanwhile, being nowhere near a comparison, Sophia was the woman he wanted to spend his life with.

And so, all while _trying_ to keep these kind of thoughts at bay, Amy Santiago went about her day off striving to be as productive as always although,somewhere in between vacuuming the entire apartment and doing her weekly laundry, failing _miserably_. Her thoughts had slowly been trailing off a bit too far, too far from the podcast playing in her headphones, doing exactly the opposite of distracting her from what she wanted to forget so bad. 

She had been doing just fine distracting herself - or maybe she just felt so simply because she felt nothing but numb - but nonetheless she kept telling herself one thing: 

She. Felt. Fine. 

Or that was right until she accidentally, absentminded and distracted by the wandering thoughts of him, knocked over a picture frame: not just any picture frame. This one, in particular, exhibited a picture of her and the old nine-nine squad at that one take away-themed Thanksgiving, where Jake, to Amy’s surprise and secret delight, had changed his mind and participated. Not only that but he’d also dressed up _beautifully, for her,_ which Amy, of course, had had to document. In this very picture, quite chaotic since that was the definition of their squad, Amy could be seen smiling tenderly and distracted at Jake as she reached over to wipe away what had been samosa stuffing clinging to the corner of his mouth. 

Not in a million years, or at least _before_ running into him again, had she paid the picture any particular attention. Although, looking at it then, the goofy yet tender look on Jake’s face as he’d let her wipe away the food on his face cut through Amy’s heart like a dagger. 

Feeling any kind of strength or will to keep on fighting the wave of emotions crashing to the shore of her mind, Amy felt tears rolling down her cheeks as she hopelessly let her body give in to the drowning feeling resulting in her entire body sliding to sit on the floor, falling back against the side of her couch. 

She probably wasn’t fine after all. 

It took 20 minutes, apparently being the magic number in question of how long it took to drain her tear ducts as well as anything suggesting any kind of physical force, before Amy could silence herself. 

Turns out coming to terms with the fact that one night with Jake Peralta _was_ way more, way _deeper_, than a mistake. Yes, she felt ashamed of what she did to Sophia; to her relationship with Jake. 20 minutes was what it took for the emotionally beaten and bruised woman to realise that if she could go back to her moral crossroad that night at Shaw’s, then yes, she would go down the self-indulgent road again if it meant she got to be Jake Peralta’s object of desire one more time. 

She might’ve be a mistake to him, but he sure wasn’t, never would be, a one to her.

If Amy’s goal had been to distract herself, which it originally had been, then wasting 20 minutes of her day, on the floor crying about Jake, was probably considered a fail. Even Amy who’d usually profoundly refuse to fail had to admit. She didn’t even have the force to hate herself for failing at something, instead just fixating on the one thing she could grasp: a shower. A shower would probably do her good, she managed to convince herself promptly forcing herself off the floor and in direction of her bathroom to wash off whatever minimal amount of makeup was left around her bloodshot eyes and red cheeks.

The dark thoughts faded, if not entirely then at the very least a bit, once she was safely hidden away from reality inside her shower, where the water seemingly washed away her worries and anxieties about the future - if not permanently then at least for some time. Usually Amy would stay ultra efficient meaning that her showers would last no longer than 7 minutes (unless she had to shave and exfoliate, of course) but today was different and she pitied herself a long, warming shower to drain her body of a unlimited spectrum of cold, dismal emotions. At least in there she could pretend that these drops of warm water on her face came from the shower rather than her once again brimming tear ducts.

Amy quickly lost track of exactly how long she spent fading away in the shower. However there was no overlooking the early winter-darkness that, by the time she walked out of her bathroom with damp hair and fresh pyjamas, had drenched the entirety of her apartment in a deserted darkness. She made her way back down the hall, in the process managing to flick a switch thus her living room back to life. The newcomer light allowed her to measure a safe distance from which she could let her body slump backwards and expect her couch to catch her. 

_Now what?_ she though to herself. Usually she’d choose a book over watching TV, well knowing of the scientifically proven fact that the former was more relaxing and beneficial for the brain. Yet, tonight, Amy couldn’t seem to bring herself to care about scientific facts - what was the point anyways? Who cared whether she read a book or watched tv? Not her. And so before she could come up with any counterarguments she was browsing through Netflix, looking for something to kill her notion of time and more importantly her place in reality. There she stayed, hour after hour, completely losing the notion of how late it actually was. 

Right up until a knock on her door caught her off guard routinely causing her to look at the time on her phone: Had someone tried to reach her? No.What time was it even? 

01:54 AM. 

The arrival of uninvited guests - _especially_ in Brooklyn, _particularity_ in the middle of night - was surely far more than unsettling enough for Amy, her face turning into a confused frown as she kicked off her blanket to leave comfort and warmth behind her to attain her door.

“Who is it?” She waited by the door. 

“It’s me… Jake.” 

Mimicking the imperceptibly fast pace of a hummingbird’s batting wings Amy’s heart came to a halt before riding straight up into her throat in pure disbelief. Never before had she looked at her door with such wavering hesitance. Opening the door would be such a simple act; one she’d carried out countless times before. Yet, the moment the mystery guest had introduced himself, the moment had lost its status as _just another_ to add to the countless pile. Even though she didn’t know Jake’s exact motif and why he was herre, what _exactly_ had acted as catalyst to bring him to show up unannounced, Amy knew that there was no avoiding some kind of point of no return. Whatever happened would result in a switch; a change in her life. 

Another knock yanked her back to reality. 

“Ames? Are you there?”

God, she’d never be able to hate how him pronouncing her nickname made her feel inside. 

“Y-Yeah,” she whisper-yelled just loud enough for him to hear, yet not enough to give her neighbours a reason to feel miffed about her inconvenient late night emprise. 

Though she knew the thought was irrational, the silence that made its presence known made Amy wonder if her revealing her presence had scared him off. It was killing her. The silence only made her own heartbeat seem louder, convincing her that it boomed louder than an effusive July thunderstorm. She hated it, and oh how she also couldn’t help wondering if he felt the same way; she wondered if he also he felt uneasy, afraid of how loud and revelatory the beating of his heart subjectively seemed. Did his heart even beat hard for her like hers did for him?

“Can-,” though it was muffled by the door’s act as a frontier between them Amy could hear a sigh of his interrupt himself. Not a loathing nor annoyed one; rather jittery and indecisive. “Can I come in? _Please_.”

However, cast under the spell of an unknown force, there appeared no hesitance in Amy’s mind meaning that before allowing herself too much time to turn it over in her head, the door stood wide open before her. 

There he was. Ruffled, unruly curls dashing onto forehead, deep brown eyes hiding in the hallway’s shadows, iconic flannel and jeans: Jake Peralta. Although in contrast to his archetypal boisterous character he then and there seemed closed in on himself thus prompting Amy to see an army of red flags: something was wrong. 

“W-what are you doing here?” She let go of the door-handle allowing her hand to fall to a rest by her side.

“I need to talk to you.” His tone was firm yet pleading. Harsh but soft all at once. 

“Jake,” the sound of his name didn’t leave her lips like it used to, he thought to himself, hating the sigh following behind like a haltering semi-colon. “This is not going to do any of us, especially you, any good-“

“Amy,” he begged daring to cross the threshold in the sweep of three big steps immediately putting them face to face with just inches to spare between them, only by the sole reason of Jake managing to restrain himself from moving further and thus possibly giving in to the craving for their lips’ and nose’s touch. 

“Jake, “ she repeated unable to understand whether she was repeating herself out of loss of words or because his name tasted so good dancing off the tip of her tied tongue. “You’re not supposed to be here. You can’t be here: you’re marri-“

“I’m not,” the two, in _any other _context, simple words landed like a bomb leaving another dead, post-apocalyptic silence to swallow them both. This said silence allowed Jake to make out the sound of a shocked hitch in Amy’s otherwise always even breathing pattern: he had to speak up. He owed her an explanation instead of this undefined silence. Having obviously gained her full attention Jake knew he couldn’t waste another breath on just standing there staring. For every second he bit his tongue, afraid of opening his big, stupid mouth to explain why he was actually here, it was giving Amy was given yet another second to escape her brief state of shock and potentially wish him gone. This he’d respect but on the other hand he’d much rather let her hear what he had to say; let her know why he was here. 

Her dark brown eyes were indeed captivating though also obviously tired and definitely very lost. God, he once more came to realise just how much he loved them, amongst many other of her attributes, so much. 

“I didn’t- I _couldn’t_ go through with it: I didn’t marry Sophia.”

The dead silence continuously weighed down the atmosphere while neither of them knew what to say or do next, especially Amy who now stood with what could only be described as a completely disoriented moral compass and her turn to speak. 

“I- I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

“I called off the wedding…” His feet shuffled nervously, comparable to a child knowing he did something bad. “I couldn’t do it knowing that… Knowing that I had so many doubts and questions lying there yearning for affirmation and answers somewhere else.” 

The realisation of just how turbulent and incalculable the situation really was turning out seemed to hit Amy like a speeding train. His words heavily implied what she’d secretly hoped for, but now she couldn’t seem to come to terms with it: not now that the situation and wish was facing her. 

Suddenly nothing seemed safer than denial. 

“Jake, that’s not- it’s not right.”

“What do you mean?” faster than a lightning lighting up a sky his before innocent, nervous expression changed into confusion, a tenseness _stronger_ than the fear of rejection.

“We’ve seen each other one evening during, what, the past 6 years? You can’t give up the woman you’ve chosen to _marry_ for some old friend you’ve briefly… fooled around with!”

“That’s the thing!” he erupted daring to take the remaining step that’d bring him beyond the threshold and actually into her apartment. “You’re-“ without thinking he took another step towards, closer to her although stopping when her response was to take a step back as to deviate the possible result of him touching her. 

“You’re not just… _some friend_,” the last two words clearly dripped with desperation and the fear of her considering him as exactly and not more than this. “You’ve been so much more to me ever since right before you left the nine-nine.”

A sad curiosity seemed to settle upon Amy who suddenly showed no sign of wanting to interrupt him. 

“I know it’s dumb but remember how I was constantly trying to prove to you how much you loved working at the nine-nine and shouldn’t leave for the new job? It wasn’t because I didn’t want you to move on and rise through the ranks; it wasn’t because I was trying to hold you back; it was because I didn’t want to lose you… I knew it’d be so much harder to stay in contact, and although I’m partly to blame and hate to say it… I was right. I mean, look at us now.” 

The two, even Jake himself like he couldn’t believe it, stood in silence reflecting upon what had been said. Should he just continue talking or was he just overwhelming her? He wished she’d say something. 

“But,” she started with a sigh almost like she was giving up when she had barely even begun. “You have to realise it’s _too_ _late_. I went my way, you went yours and I’m… _flattered_ that you used to like me but you also have to understand that things are different now. Life and circumstances have changed - not only for me but also you.” Her eyes dropped to the floor to save herself from looking at him. “You’re supposed to be with Sophia - not me.” 

What came next dropped from his lips in uttermost sincerity, without a single beat of hesitance, almost like it’d been luring in the back of his mind just waiting for the right moment to escape. 

“Amy, I was only with her because I wasn’t with you.” 

She allowed herself to look up to be met by jittery eyes and a just as nervous chuckle or maybe more of a huff. She couldn’t tell anymore. 

“I know this is ludicrous but, Ames, trust me when I say that that one evening we had together forced me to come to terms with thoughts I’d tried to push off for so long. I felt like shit, and I still do, for doing what I’m doing to Sophia, and even to you, but then all at once I also know that it’s only because I’ve been proved right: nothing or no-one feels more _right_ than you.” 

Somewhere deep beneath all of the confusion her moral compass was on the brink of breaking under the weight of the heavy internal conflict - a weight, options, it definitely wasn’t trained to handle. One of said options would be to simply close the door on Jake and this entire mess although this would also mean denying herself, and Jake, what appeared to be the key to their happiness. Opposing this, also more importantly her morals, she could give in to what she, what they, wanted and potentially experience a whirlwind of what she’d always thought of was simply ‘what could’ve been’ and an unspoken puppy love heading for passionate romance. Holding her back was the though of having selfishly, in the heat of the moment, broken up an engagement - practically a marriage even. 

Somehow every option seemed to have some kind of lose end; some higher force was just waiting to reprimand her.

“I-“ she took another step back wanting to withdraw not only her physical self but also her heart, worn clearly and openly displayed on her sleeve for him to interpret. In the soft light of the moon outside the building her eyes shone, tears brimming with guilt and confusion. “Jake, this is too messy. I know I dragged you into this and I’m to blame, and I’m forever sorry about that, but-“

“That’s my point!” He opposed her withdrawal by taking a step - just one as to not seem too pushy - in her designated direction away from the front door and into the combined living/dining room.  “You’re not to blame for this,” his eyes pleaded along with his words. 

“If I genuinely didn’t want to hold you, kiss you, be with you, I wouldn’t have followed you into what you call_ this mess_. I wouldn’t have let you kiss me, I would’ve pushed you away, apologised and left that night at Shaw’s. And I know that there is no excuse for us regarding Sophia - what we did to her is wrong, yes, and it’s my responsibility to try to somewhat untangle that web-but what we did to us? I don’t want to dismiss it - or you, Amy Santiago - as a mistake.”

Silence.

“Please say something.”

The sound of footsteps. First one, then another one. 

The heavy feeling is his gut immediately disintegrated into nothing but a distant memory the very second the warm feeling of her lips accompanied by her soft hands cupping his face took over. The moment made him feel as if he was melting into her, a fusion and puddle of hope, relief and desire. It didn’t even matter that, in contrary to all the happiness he was suddenly feeling, he felt the few tears spilling onto her cheeks before colliding with their lips and leaving a salty taste. 

“I don’t know what we’re doing,” she whimpered in between kisses gradually growing longer and more intense, more tears threatening to spill not out of sadness but rather happy bewilderment. 

One hand placed on her hip, the other placed on top of hers on his cheek, he gently attempted to soothe her with calm strokes. “Shhh,” he pecked where he could feel the trail of her tears.

Another whimper made its way through the wandering lips. “I’m sorry…” 

“Hey, stop apologising,” there was a time and place for everything, Jake figured, and as for then it was his time to hold, calm down and reassure this woman before him who for reasons he wish he could figure out was so afraid of giving in. 

“Don’t apologise - especially not to me,” his fingers combed through her dark hair allowing him to pull her in to place a tender kiss to her forehead. 

“We’ll figure this out - you and me,” was mumbled into the very same spot he’d just kissed. His hands were still tangled up in her dark roots, her hands having now fallen from his face to his chest when he pulled back just a few inches to get a good look at her face, amongst this her beautiful although painfully worried eyes. 

At least his were reassuringly warm and confident, like most times, and there was somewhat safety and hope for tomorrow’s answers to be found in them. 

“Until then do you wanna go to sleep? Did I wake you up?”

Amy had completely lost track of time but as soon as Jake had questioned her it was almost as if it triggered a heavy tiredness, physical as well asmental, forcing her to fight the feeling of being dragged down towards the floor.

“No, don’t worry, I was just watching some tv, but now might be good time to go to bed,” a nod sent his hands wandering down to hers to gently guide her to her bedroom. “Here, let me tug you in before I go and then we can just talk tomorrow.” 

He stopped by the door, staying behind at a safe distance while letting his eyes follow her figure as it approached and sat down on the edge of the (neatly made, of course) queen sized bed. The last thing he wanted to was to come off pushy.

“Stay.”

The word fell promptly from her lips. Not that he needed to be but Jake couldn’t quite tell if he was being ordered to or if it was more of a suggestion from her to him. His doubt came not from a place of what he desired but more of place of moral. He knew sleeping with her tonight would mean literally _sleeping_ and nothing else which he was more than okay with. Still there was a nagging feeling making him question whether or not it was taking advantage of her emotional state for the sake of his own contentment. 

“You sure?” He didn’t budge from his position leaning against her door frame. Not yet. 

She replied by the nod of her head and the way her eyes’ pleading was enhanced by the moon outside. 

A nod and a modest smile was returned before walking to the other side of her bed. On the way there he’d shrugged off his coat before considerately hanging it on an empty chair. To his relief she finally looked back over her shoulder at him, from where she was resting on her side, with a smile in return.

She lied with her back turned to him, not because she intended to evade him but because it was what she usually did. The sound of his pants, the usual jeans, being unzipped and falling to the ground cued the dip her mattress did under the weight of his body. Feeling him crawl into hiding from the cold under her freshly washed covers somehow felt like him coming home. 

The unusual, still new, but nonetheless nice heat from their bodies immediately merged under their shared duvet. Although they’d done so much more the last time they saw each other, this moment felt like the equivalent of starting over and like the first time: calm breaths camouflaging each their racing hearts and the apprehensiveness keeping them from allowing their limbs to entangle. 

Amy was mindlessly staring at the glowing clock on her night stand, when, not quite sure of what had given her the courage to, she decided to move. Something about the contrast between their desperate call last night and now, lying here together, must’ve given her the courage to surmountthe remaining hesitance. She’d made up her mind without meaning to, and so Amy switched to lie on her opposite shoulder thus facing Jake. His eyes had been shut close in a hopeless attempt to fall asleep but failed to stay so the moment he felt her gaze on him. Eyes opened; eyes locked. 

Except for their tired yet comforting gazes nothing else was exchanged. 

Jake shifted calmly as if he wasn’t perfectly comfortable already and, in spite of the action being completely mundane, this was enough to adjoin the two. Amy was drawn in, timidly shuffling across what separated the unspoken ‘his’ and ‘her’ side which had been created out of respect for the other. Jake, as by an instinct he’d never realised was a part of him, instinctually acted upon her suggestion by lifting his side of the duvet to let her into his arms. Here the years apart seemed even more foolish than ever before. How come she’d wasted time looking for home in other places when she’d had Jakob Peralta right by her side some years ago? 

In that moment, the instant she felt his arms close around her, a colliding of contrasting feelings arose within her: the newly found magic of lying in his arms for the first time and the seemingly old familiarity of having known him for what felt like a lifetime. It was one of those feelings which epicenter was in the gut, flimsy and confused, but then spread to the rest of the body in the motion of a aftershock, a wave of pure peace and happiness. 

Jake’s arms tightening further around her was safe; burying her face in the soft skin of his neck right below his jaw was coming home. A tender kiss was placed to her temple. This is where she wanted to be: all moral uproar considered. Lying against his throat she felt him let out a relaxed, happy sigh.

“Good night, Ames. We'll figure it all out - don't worry.” Another kiss fell to the top of her head. 

She smiled to herself trying to forget about the guilt and worries of tomorrow. That would be then and lying there in bed with him was now.

“Good night, Jake.” 


	6. can you breathe me in as fast as I can breathe you out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!
> 
> Okay, so you might've noticed that I've changed the chapter number to "?" and that is because I've started questioning my initial idea for this fic and therefor might end up doing a longer version. I'm sorry if any of you were expecting an ending soon, but I promise it either way won't be too long - I just need to figure out the best ending. 
> 
> So stick with me, please! Promise that it'll all come together and I'll update more frequently!
> 
> I put a lot of work into, especially, this chapter so let me know what you think! It would mean the world to me :') And also thank you for the sweet comments I've received already!! <3
> 
> xx  
Em

In the form of dawn, reenacting the moon’s casting of light from a few hours earlier, the sun rose to its designated time to penetrate the thin material of her bedroom’s curtains drowning said room in a soft, drowsy light. A soft, drowsy light which happened to be strong enough to wake him up or at the very least cause his eyes to stir while rest of his body had a hard time following the cues coming from his barely conscious brain. Though it wasn’t a lot, he was nonetheless aware of a few facts: his surroundings were not the ones of his apartment, the morning’s arrival was upon him, there was softly curved body lying next to him and lastly he was aware of the warmth the body radiated curled up into his chest like it belonged there. 

His eyes managed to fight against the heavy tiredness restning in every limb of his body and open to help him finally fully understand the scene he was currently taking part in. 

Time: the clock on the nightstand in his immediate field of vision told him the horrid fact that it was just barely 6AM. 

Location: delicate colors, decorations of all kinds and last but not least a perfect neatness reminded him of a certain someone’s apartment. 

With who: warmth pressed against his chest immediately drew his sight to the right spot, where he got to take in the purest sight he’d been met by in a long time; also better known as Amy Santiago fast asleep on her right side fully doubled up in his arms like it was somehow the most natural thing in the world. Behind her, spread out on her floral pillow, unruly waves of hair dispersed wildly and with no regards to defined patterns as if it were a field of dark wild flowers. 

Of course all he wanted to do was touch and explore the tangles, pick these flowers growing from her. But, just like picking and taking home flowers meant to thrive in the wild, that would be selfish of him. Plus it’d also mean he’d have to draw her from her peaceful rest - something he for nothing in this world wanted. Therefor, instead, he settled on admiring, staring at and taking in every little detail of her; everything from the intense fullness of her lashes to the way her skin tasted, sweet like he’d always imagined, when he tranquilly allowed himself to lean down and peck the side of her face that wasn’t hidden against the mattress. 

The peck was light yet the longer kind even though he tried to be careful. She’d wake up when she was ready to; not because he had this strange feeling of missing her even though she was right there in his arms, as close as they’d ever been. He drew back to allow himself another good look at her, mainly to admire but also to make sure she was still peacefully asleep.There he was also met by the feeling of tiny bursts of happiness revolting like a chain reaction in his chest and stomach: this was what he’d been looking to feel for so long however not knowing until she came along. 

Movement in his arms instantly drew him out of his thoughts only to be met by something so much better than the previous daydream. Indeed, it was the beautiful reality that was Amy Santiago unconsciously shuffling, burying herself further into his chest, and his arms automatically tightened around her even though there was almost to no more space between them to give to her. Then, after sliding his hands to the lower part of her back, his fingers would start forming small drawings of affection. This went on for God even knows how long. Him showering her with silent admiration and even softer kisses to any exposed skin that might be exposed whilst she slumbered peacefully in the love cot formed by his arms and chest. At some point her fingers gradually, more and more purposefully, started stroking him back making the skin covering his collarbones tingle beneath the touch, but even then she still seemed asleep and so he let her be, enjoying feeling of being alive and present in this silent moment with her. 

It was only hours later that, or so the clock told him, he could sense her stirring washing away the nagging feeling of missing her. She’d move a bit then lie still like nothing had happened, this repeated a few times, before her head _finally_ tilted just enough for him to see her look at him and, damn, who would’ve thought a pair of drowsy, golden brown eyes could make Jake’s heart do a billion summersaults? Certainly not him but it very much did. 

For a moment, when his eyes were met hers where they were perfectly placed right where late morning sun highlighted them perfectly, she said nothing. Instead she simply craned her head further to angle a peck to the underside of his chin, light as a butterfly, before repeating the action, placing one more and one more, progressively moving down his chin, neck, jaw and lastly neck. The world around them was silent and all he could hear was the delicate sound resulting from her lips detaching from his warm, dewy skin. Finally, paired with a heavy exhalation, the last peck stamped his sternum.

Jake had never felt so alive. He was sure of it. 

“Morning,” he yawned into her hair before adoringly placing a kiss to the same spot. 

As a reaction to the affectionate touch, one so untried yet a feeling she already felt appealed to grow addicted to even though she knew addictions were often a dangerous matter, Amy instantly felt blood rush to her cheeks adding to her skin a warm pink tint. This shade of ting being similar to, Jake briefly remembered, a color he’d noticed in the sky on multiple early mornings where he’d been making his way home from working the night. Perhaps he didn’t exactly love morning but he remembered loving the glow and soothing color palette of a Brooklyn dawn. 

“Hey,” she smiled utterly overwhelmed by the instant urge to bury her face back into the safety of his chest but instead, having to somewhat strain herself,settled on keeping her head tilted back as to keep her gaze fixed on his - no backing out this time, she’s made up her mind. Circling around whatever their predicament was, still very much undefined, would be further waste of precious time they’d already missed out on. And she could’ve sworn to herself that, solely based on the way Jake’s eyes shone just a bit brighter when his eyes traced her entity, they were meant to be something greater than just _what ifs_ and _could’ve beens_. What exactly she, or anyone else for that matter, couldn’t tell but she was sure of one thing: Jake Peralta was a chance she was willing to take. 

“How are you feeling?” He languidly brushed a strand of hair away from her face and back into a safe hold behind her ear which had Amy swearing to herself she could feel tingling where he’d just brushed her skin. The night’s remains made themselves present through a slight hoarseness to his voice but, looking past this fact, Amy had never heard him speak with such softness before. Sure, they’d had moments; ones where they felt things they couldn’t speak up about though there was definitely _something_ there; ones of admiration and maybe just a bit more; ones of growing henpecked emotions. Although _this_? This was something else. This was every single atom in his body channeling the vulnerability that was his infatuation for her right into the open space between them as well as her. 

“I’m… good,” because ‘Better than ever before because you’re here with me’ maybe was a bit soon in their given situation. 

“Good?” he popped his eyebrows humorously creating a very ‘Jake’ contrast to his still drowsy eyes and that was one of the many things that drew her to him: he was not just _anyone_ but rather _someone_ who had a certain _something_ about him, a way of doing things, that no one else could quite imitate. 

“Just good? That’s a shame.”

It took seconds, barely, for Amy to pick up on the teasing ring to his voice which laced up with the tiredness would’ve been very well camouflaged, if it wasn’t for the simple fact that she apparently had cracked the code to his way of being a long time ago - even with all these years in between. 

“You don’t deserve me stroking your ego _too_ hard when you come running here in the middle of the night, waking me up and whatnot.”

Two could play that game. The thick sarcasm in her voice was definitely weighing heavily as she spoke - all of this paired with a nonchalant shrug of the shoulders? Jake had without a doubt been challenged to a duel. 

“Oh, is that so?” his tiredness held nothing against a smile when he could be nothing but very entertained by this frisky side of Amy Santiago. 

“Yeah,” even encircled by his arms Amy managed to fully arch her back in a stretch only to top it off with a performatory yawn“I actually still feel kind of tired so I’m just going to go back to sleep…” she trailed off as she turned over to lie on her opposite shoulder facing away from Jake. Her shuffling out of his arms definitely crossed a certain line within him, a line he until that very moment was was yet to know he truthfully possessed but quickly came to realise he shamelessly did when it resulted in what could be classified as a _growl_ escaping him. 

“Oh, don’t-“ he shuffled after her only to latch onto and pull her back first into safe return to his arms. “Don’t play me like that, Santiago,” surprisingly there was no hesitance to the way he then pressede his lips to her ear where spoke directly into it, earning him a full-blown laugh, and it at no point came across, to either of them, as odd or staggering.

“You're stuck here with me now,” he joked while nibbling possessively at the ear along with the area surrounding, loving but somehow also not able to believe it. 

“Ugh, really?” her laugh had quieted down and she now spoke with a breathy groan.

That breathy voice was soon cut of though when suddenly, somehow, earning Amy’s confusion, Jake managed to spin her around in his arms as to place them face to face; nose to nose; staring directly into each other’s eyes with such intensity that goosebumps spread all across her body. 

“Really,” his voice switched back to soft, _very_ soft, yet also stern and so sincere Amy would’ve believed anything he said in that moment. “If you wanna be?”

Although it was metaphorically when she felt like she was swallowing her previous pride and cockiness, Amy did swallow, what felt like, quite loudly in reaction to the exceedingly intense position they were all at once in as dust particles tumbled around the sunlit space around them. 

There was not exactly a way of pointing out what had shifted within her but something had, and she had such strong urge to to act on it. Maybe it was the way he’d grabbed her waist, forcing her back into his arms and then somehow also into a certain headspace, where it _really_ finally hit her that this moment was not a fever dream but instead very much real and would have real life consequences - consequences of which the fallout she was ultimately in charge of. 

Noses were still pressed up against one another, the tip of his to the bridge of hers, when the animalistic part of her brain won an internal battle, one she wasn’t completely aware of until then, and drove her to grab his face and pull him into a searing, heavy kiss. 

The air around them exploded with an energy made of temporarily forgotten, although always returning, yearning for the other’s uttermost closeness and it was only a matter of seconds, milliseconds, before Jake could neither more or less but give in to their bodies’ demands conducting him to crowd himself on top of his newfound muse who gladly accepted her new designated spot beneath him.Meanwhile their lips almost never lost contact, busy with relishing and only briefly parting in need of respiration, exchanging gnaws and tugs. The limiting themselves to pecks from earlier was very much forgotten and out the window. 

Slender hands gripped his biceps intuitively provoking a flex under her touch. Continuing up his arms and shoulders before taking on his sides she made sure to take it all in: his every muscle, the way the skin shaped around his ribs, small beauty spots who’d up until now had been a mystery to her and more importantly the way his flesh and skin seemed to be her perfect handful no matter where she grabbede him; as if he was meant to be touched and adored by her. Only her. 

Her touch continued its travel all the way down his ribcage, both sides covered by a hand each, until she reached his lower flanks prompting her hands to centre and meet on the lowest part of his spine. 

From there on and all the way up to his neck, delicately with the full surface area of her palm and inevitably inflaming the desire taking over him, Amy traced every joint of his spinal column, internally counting each and every one of them. 

Upon reaching its final destination, which from the very beginning had been the thick curls on top of his head: somewhere she’d always dreamed of grabbing, fist full, and tug onto like it was a matter of life and death. 

They’ve reached the point of no return. This time there would be no interruptions, no panicking and no running away. The heat between them gradually increased.Sloppy, but _good_, kisses accompanied by just as sloppy, but oh so satisfying, breaths, moans and whimpers filled the air. The situation was taking them where they’d wanted to be for so long, the closest they could ever physically be. It quickly but carefully took them where their yearning souls and craving vessels soon were clad in nothing sweaty sheets and each other’s skin, moans and declarations in the form of lustful whimpers. 

Their bodies, although many parts still complete strangers to each other, fit and moved in perfect harmony. They were insatiable and this could only be stilled by each other by reaching the final climax. 

Following this, in the late hours of their morning, Amy’s entire body was now freshly tattooed by red love marks created by his teeth and grasping fingers, meanwhile Jake, especially his back, displayed clear trails of where her nails had held onto him, matching the purple imprints of possession on his neck. Jake would’ve kept adding to the collection forming on her skin, continuously placing licks and bites to her skin even after slowly coming down from their climax, if she hadn’t pushed him onto his back and hovered over him creating the most beautiful scene before him. 

There was something about a dewy-skinne, naked and unruly-haired Amy Santiago looking down at you with an ‘_i got you_’-look in her eyes that simply couldn’t be anything but the best thing he’d ever witnessed with his own two eyes. 

“We can’t lie here all day,” she smirked knowing very well that she, and he neither, would _really_ mind staying in bed all day to repeat the act till they ran out of hours. 

“We could,” he reached up to grab her face and pull her down into a lingering kiss; a kiss which she just barely managede to get back under control and interrupt before she could get lost in the rush of it all once more. 

“Yes, _maybe,_ but let's get up, okay? I’ll make us some coffee,” she smiled sweetly, returning to the sweet innocent persona she was known for and, of course, Jake Peralta couldn’t deny her anything at all even if he wished to. 

In the lukewarm air of the forenoon which had grown while they were caught up in bed, Jake, who now stood in her kitchen, alongside the brewing coffeepot, had a surreal almost overwhelming feeling of more to come mulling inside of him. No way he would’ve believed them if someone had told him just months ago that he’d be caught up in the perfect epiphany that was witnessing Amy Santiago clad in (_only_) his trademark flannel, and apparently she could do pretty much _anything_, like stand on her tippy toes in order to reach two mugs from upper shelf in her overhead cupboard, like she was currently doing, and it was enough to have Jake pinching himself. Simply standing by, watching, instead of trapping her against the kitchen counter to do anything he wanted to her was beyond average self-control and Jake knew it. 

“Here you go,” she poured them both a cup before handing him his. 

“Thanks,” the steam coming from the warm liquid hit his face making it impossible for him to know if it was the coffee or her effect on him (maybe a bit of both) working its magic on him. 

She leaned back against the kitchen counter throwing him a shy look over the top of her mug, eyes clearly smiling enough for him to know she was shyly biting her lips behind it. They stood in a comfortable silence for a bit although it was no secret to either of them that there were _things_ to be talked about. Someone had to and so after about two silent sips Jake did it: he took the leap. 

“So…” 

Immediately letting him know that he (of course and always) had her undivided attention by cocking her eyebrows gently, she miserably failed to conceal the fact that she’d hoped he would. She must’ve realised this since her blush blew up significantly, and God, he just wanted to kiss her again and preferably never stop. 

“How are you feeling, like, about… this?” 

Another silence followed behind the sound of his voice and Amy taking a quick sip but then also breaking into a shy smile. Although she definitely felt a strong sensation of giddiness, happiness and incoming calm in the midst of the deep sea of confusion, how could she tell him what she believed in, them, without overwhelming him and taking the nature of reality for granted? She felt _so many things _that it was still incredibly hard to tell it all apart. Already scaring him off, so early on, would be such a shame. Yes, she knew _he_ had been the one to show up on her doorstep in the middle of the night; _he_ had been the one to leave Sophia for her… Then why was she still doubting her instincts? 

“I feel… good.”

She couldn’t deny the very clear fact that, from the way butterflies went crazy in her stomach, she loved the way his smile grew wider as a reaction to her answer.

“That’s good…” his nod was eager but Amy could also tell he was nervous, restlessly biting his lip when not knowing how to shape and share whatever was on his mind. On the other hand, he had nothing to worry about because neither did she - it wasn’t like any of them had ever been, or even imagined being, in a similar situation. A situation that all at once was very easy but then also very complicated. Furthermore, even though this specific square in the big puzzle they were currently trying to place was complicated enough on its own, Amy couldn’t help but feel specially curious about one other thing. 

Although, she guessed, it didn’t really concern her… 

Or _it did _but then again _not really_. 

The confusion and uncertainty about how much she should question the matter roared in her mind suddenly escaping her off the cuff. 

“How did Sophia take it?”

A bucket of ice cold water being poured over the ambience was an appropriate, if not understated, way of describing the following seconds. Jake was no longer smiling like he’d been before but instead looked like a person whose dream scenario, by the flick of a shift, had suddenly turned into a nightmare would look. Just as fast as he Amy came to understand that what she’d previously been enjoying was the calm bliss to be found in the eye of the hurricane, and was now, after stepping onto unsafe grounds, caught and about to be lurched into the hurricane itself. 

“Take what _exactly_?” 

The look on his face wasn’t quite oblivious, after all, they were both very much aware of their tricky situation, but Jake still looked somewhat… puzzled. As if he’d honestly and absolutely not, under no circumstances or in any other parallel universe, expected this specific topic: Sophia Perez. 

What did he mean by _what exactly_? Yes, she had messede up too, but it was him who’d bailed on his future wife on their wedding day, and not her, after all. But apparently there now seemed to be more to the story than what he’d told her yesterday, she just hadn’t thought to ask having been all caught up in Jake confessing his feelings to her and all the chaos. 

The heavy feeling in her gut, a gut that was almost always right, she’d come to learn a long time ago, along with her heart picking up speed now racing with anxiety, underlined the fact that things were definitely not going where she’d hoped just moments ago. Why on earth did she have to explain to Jake that him leaving his almost-wife for Amy herself was bound to raise questions and an aftermath to resolve? 

“What do you mean ‘what exactly?’? You sure haven’t forgotten that you basically left Sophia at the altar to come see me just yesterday, right?” A nervous chuckle was thrown in in a desperate attempt to save the prevailing turn the situation had so suddenly taken. 

A pregnant silence immediately killed off said attempt.

“I- uh,” it didn’t go by unnoticed how Jake put down his mug as if to brace himself for impact as he half-stammered. “I never actually told her the uhm- reason behind my decision.I just told her I couldn’t marry her, then ran back to the hotel I was staying at for the wedding, packed my things before dumping them at Charles’. Then Charles of course had to pry so I told him everything, and then, after taking some time to wrap my head around the whole thing, I came here to see you.”

Amy had managed to bury it, given that she trusted Jake, but had deep down feared the storm after the quiet, the war after the peace and this was it: he hadn’t told Sophia about them. For all she knew Sophia could be God knows where in Manhattan’s concrete jungle thinking that Jake just wasn’t _ready_ get married to her rather than _not wanting_ to get married to her - there was a world of difference between the two and it all came pouring down on Amy in that very moment. 

Eyes briefly closed in despair she tried to figure out her next move: had she completely misread the situation and even worse misread Jake? Jake that she, looking past their years of falling out, thought she knew so well? Had she gotten so caught up in the rush of feelings upon seeing him that she’d failed to take into consideration the true colors of the situation? The questions all flooded her brain with the force of a tsunami. 

“You didn’t-“ her breath hitched and eyes closed once more, somewhat giving herself room to put herself back together, before jumping in head first. “You didn’t tell her about us?” 

And although Jake did look awfully regretful upon hearing her question him like this, truthfully representing the good heart Amy deep down knew he had, there could be no other way. She needed the truth even if it wasn’t what she’d hoped for. 

“Ames, listen,” he took a deep breath. 

“Back then I though I could brush past it. You and I weren’t talking after that nigh at Shaw’s and I, idiotically, thought I could fix myself by still marrying her. I-“

“No, Jake,” she interrupted looking sternly into his eyes, allowing him to see a shade of dark brown he’d never seen in her eyes before. 

Feeling trapped in the kitchen she brushede past him in search for safer distancing in the wider space of her paired living/dining room. “I don’t mean back then.” 

It dawned upon her just how much worse the problem actually was. She had now actually been the other woman not once but _twice - _the second time being just this morning and going all the way. “I mean: you didn’t tell her why you were not able to marry her?”

In the rush of the moment where Jake had looked his dressed in white and, he had to admit, beautiful fiancé that no, he was so sorry but he couldn’t marry her, it hadn’t occurred to him to actually explain Sophia _why_. To him the explanation had been clear: Amy. 

Though he’d completely brushed past the fact that Sophia had no good explanation to this, completely unaware of Amy’s newfound presence in his life, and could now, possibly, be thinking that he just needed time or space. 

Sophia didn’t even know her future husband had met up with Amy all those months ago, let alone that he had feelings for her that caused him to call off the wedding. 

“I wasn’t thinking clearly, Amy,” he wasn’t trying to excuse it per se but he was feeling hopeless and this felt like grasping onto whatever small explanatory bits he happened to have left. He never had any intentions of hurting Amy, of course not, he wanted to be with her! 

But now he saw things from her perspective: a perspective where she was caught in the role of the secret ‘other woman’, who he couldn’t commit fully to for a list of reasons, one of them being the fact that his relationship with Sophia technically, explicitly wasn’t over. 

“Oh, so you weren’t _thinking clearly _when you interrupted your own wedding and then decided to come here?” Amy’s words were pure venom at this point as she paced back and forth between the dining table and the couch. 

“That’s not what I meant,” he defended himself following her path from earlier out of the kitchen. 

“I meant that I didn’t exactly have a script or a clear explanation ready, when I told Sophia. I just… even with Sophia standing right in front of me, all ready and dressed in white, I couldn’t stop thinking about you, and so… I just snapped: I told her and got the hell out of there.” 

As soon as it was out Jake realised it didn’t exactly sound as good as he had intended it to. It actually made him sound rather inconsiderate of both women’s feelings. It was an understatement to say that this fact was slowly sinking in and eating him up alive.

“… Which I am now realising was dick-move on my part-“

“God, is this really happening?” he could hear Amy mumble to herself rubbing her temples as to appease the horrifying headache the situation had brought upon her. 

“Ames, I-“ he started marching over to where she’d somewhat delimited herself behind the couch. 

“Stop.” 

Jake Peralta wasn’t about to oppose Amy Santiago, especially given the circumstances, and froze on the spot across from her with the couch between them as a border. They looked right at each other clearly communication the large range of emotions they both felt: anger, fear, confusion and disappointment which resulted in the feeling reigning within the both of them: frustration. 

It was as if every word, movement, sound and thought that had been thrown around for the past 10 minuets solidified in the air only to drop to the ground creating a non-existent sound of shattering glass. _Deafening_ s_ilence_ could be used to describe the moment as well but didn’t quite contain the amount of distress they both felt standing there staring hopelessly at each other. 

Perhaps they weren’t meant to figure this out after all. 

“I can’t,” her voice trembled which immediately reminded Jake of the feeling he got that one time a perp stabbed him in the arm. Except now it was times a thousand, the dagger’s target was his heart and he wasn’t hurting for himself but rather for them. Her. 

“What do you mean-“ he tried.

“I know it’s far beyond too late to advert the consequences of what we’ve done, but… I can’t stay in this tangled web you, _we’ve_, spun ourselves. I’m not about to stand by and act like nothing, when deep down I know Sophia is completely unaware of the truth and you’re not actually… _mine_.”

The words burned and blessed her tongue all at once. Oh, how she wished to be his. 

“I don’t want to be a secret, Jake.”

Jake had_ never_ intended for her to be; he simply hadn’t thought the procedure through. Although, he now did see how bad it had to look and therefor couldn’t blame her for reacting like she did. She was just trying to protect herself. 

On the other hand he also really wished he’d let him explain: let him explain that he never intended for her to be or feel like a dark secret. Amy Santiago deserved better.

“Ames, you’re not-“

She didn’t let him finish. All hints at emotion had been drained from her leaving him to stare right into dead eyes and a blank expression. 

Her defence mechanism loaded a metaphorical gun and shot his heart. 

“I need you to leave.” 

What was left of their doomed hope, now shot down and left to die, was left scattered on the floor surrounding them both like deep waters around an island of despair. Before him he saw the woman he actually truly wanted to be with, but he couldn’t force her to look past his mistakes, when he was the one who’d rushed the job and left it to blow up in his face - hers too, actually. There was nothing for him to do but, unwillingly, comply and respect her choice at least until he had a solid solution to offer her. 

What worried him the most though was the uncertainty: was this his chance to clean up his mess or was it actually _the end_? 

He never got an answer: before he could even begin to ask she shot him down for good. 

“Please leave. _Now_.”

And so he walked out in silence leaving his hearts sad remains behind for her to take care of until his return. 

That is if she actually wished to. 


	7. don't wanna be a monster among men

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pleaseeee don't hate me for this chapter, okay? :)) Also, I figured, after focusing a lot on Amy's pov in recent chapters this seemed like a suiting place to focus on Jake's. 
> 
> Also this is a bit shorter than usual, but it's for the sake of fitting into the structure for where I see this story going! Hope you enjoy it anyways! 
> 
> Please let me know in a comment or kudos! 
> 
> xx

Being a cop, experiencing so much harm, hopelessness, chaos and everything in-between, was the hardest thing he’d ever have to handle. 

Or that’s what he thought right up until the moment Jake stood on the doorstep to Sophia and, weirdly, his apartment in an attempt to get himself to come forward and confess to what he’d done - or just knock on the door would be a good start. For the last minutes, he didn’t even remember how many at that point, he’d been restlessly pacing back and forth outside the front door to their, his and Sophia’s, so-called “home”. But it being Brooklyn it was probably just a matter of time before someone would call the cops on him since _he did_ look kind of disturbed and creepy: he couldn’t keep pacing forever. 

His heart was beating so fast; so fast he was absolutely persuaded of having never experienced any similar feeling before. Another thing he noticed, he could’ve sworn, was that he could hear every pumping movement his heart uttered, which made no sense considering he simultaneously felt lightheaded and like no oxygen was getting to his brain. Man, he had messed up so hard. Not only with Amy, but with Sophia too. 

Nevertheless he didn’t get much more time to consider, suffer and make up his mind, in reality none at all, because a loud repetitive knock from inside the apartment beat him to it and completely threw him off guard. 

“Who’s there!?” he could hear a woman’s voice yell from inside the apartment: Sophia, of course. Her sounding upset was an understatement. “I’ve been hearing pacing and mumbling for the past 5 minutes so don’t act like no one’s there! I _can_ and _will_ call the police!”

Oh, shit - no more time to think. He had to just jump, head in first and… do whatever he could. Either that or cops, probably from his own precinct, would be there to arrest him within 5 minutes. 

“No no no, please don’t! It’s me Jake!” 

The yelling and warning bangs from her side of the door seized but probably not because, if he knew her well enough, she was relieved. Not that he’d expected her to be though; he couldn’t even begin to imagine how she was feeling, abandoned by the person whom she thought she would spend the rest of her days with, and now, without her knowledge, he was back to make it _even worse._

“Can we talk?” He called out.

Silence. 5… 10… 15… seconds.

“I don’t think we have anything to talk about, Jake. I think where you stand has been made v_ery clear._” 

Venom coursed through her voice, every syllable, word and sound, which Jake couldn’t even blame her for: he deserved it. All she’d done was love him, saying yes to loving him forever when _he_ had asked her to marry him, and all it’d gotten her was being left on her wedding day; being cheated on though she wasn’t even aware of this. _Yet_. 

“You don’t have to say anything; you don’t even have to look at me… I just need to-“ he cut himself off trying to think of the right words to say though he knew nothing would ever be perfectly right. “I need to come clean: lay it all out on the table. I’m a the world’s biggest dick, and I’m not here to try to convince you of the opposite… Let me just explain a few things, okay? Please, Sophia…” 

A sigh full of regret put a period to what he had to say; what he could say as he stood outside the gates to confession waiting to learn if his admission of guilt would be welcomed. On top of this he also felt deep regret knowing he’d hurt an incredible woman, knowing he could’ve acted so much more wisely, but also at the same time not regretting every moment he’d gotten with Amy. 

Then, to his surprise, the door swung open revealing an exhausted-looking Sophia clad in sweatpants and being the exact opposite of what he knew her for: put together, cool, always on the move, determined. He’d done this to her and, if possible, he now hated himself even more. 

“Hey,” to say smiling felt inappropriate was some understatement as he put on a weak one, but he didn’t know what else to do. Scream? Cry? He sure did feel like it. The smile ended up being the less weird option although it didn’t earn him one in return and that was okay. 

Another tense silence, one more than before now that the door was no longer present as a buffer between them, crept up the stairs to where they were by the front door. It immediately let Jake know that _no_, he probably shouldn’t expect to be let in. 

“I don’t have time for small talk, Jacob. Get to the point.” 

Jacob. Oh, he was in so much trouble. 

“Eh- okay,” his hands shifted uncomfortably in his jean’s front pocket, he took a deep breath and then jumped into the freezing ocean of truth: eyes closed, head first, can’t lose. 

“So, first of all, I know this must mean nothing to you which is far beyond understandable, but just wanna say, again, how so very sorry I am for what I did to you - to us…” he paused to see if he should expect some kind of answer, reaction, the bare minimum but alas no. The only moving she did was crossing her arms defensively in front of her chest as if she was gearing up for war. His most qualified guess was that this was his cue to continue. 

“…and I’m not here to rub salt in the wound and this might be selfish, I’m not really sure anymore, but I need to tell you the truth. The _whole_ truth.”

This to some extent seemed to catch Sophia’s attention, a sudden curiosity lighting up her darker than usual eyes as if she was a kid who’s just been told they’re going to be let in on a secret. Only this secret surely wouldn’t make her feel any good. 

“A few months back, in February, something happened and I already should’ve told you back then but I didn’t because I was a confused and a huge stupid coward and I didn’t know how to tell you.”

From the look on her face Jake could tell that Sophia was slowly starting to put the pieces together. It was only a matter of words, no matter how carefully picked they were on his part, before she would crack the code and _know_. The secret would be out with taking it back being no option. 

“Remember that night I said I was going to Shaw’s with a friend from work?” he tried, not expecting an answer but hoping she’d recall which would allow him to spare her from the details. 

Then a look of realisation, the last puzzle piece falling into its designated spot consumed the look on his almost-wife’s face. He could physically see the microsecond it all came together in her mind and it felt like witnessing someone pulling the safety pin of a grenade, and now he had to stay, stand his ground, and handle the explosion. 

“Y-you…” she stammered before closing her eyes as to compose herself after the shock of the truth bomb. “You… _cheated_ on me?” he could tell the word was laced with venom, tasting horridly in her mouth as she couldn’t believe she had to say it. “And you didn’t even have the balls to tell me!?” within seconds her voice transitioned from disbelief to loud, ringing anger. 

What else could he do but comply? He knew he was the traitor; the culpable; the one in the wrong. 

“I’m so sorry.” 

“I don’t give a shit about your apologies! I was here, by your side, working my ass off for this wedding and us, meanwhile you were out and about screwing _some chick_?” 

The flinch Jake’s face upon hearing Amy be put on a par with ‘some random girl he’d just screwed’ was in no way discreet, and Sophia of course noticed. It was indeed inevitable that their relationship was over Jake knew that Sophia knew him well - they’d been together for long and about to get married after all. Also, she was a lawyer so there was really no where for him to hide. Her entire demeanour quieted down upon internally analysing the facts. 

Jake Peralta, a good guy with no scandalous past, goes out to get drinks with “someone from work” and end ups cheating on her, flinches when she belittles this other woman…

“I know her, don’t I?” 

Perhaps yes he was coming clean about everything but still he didn’t exactly feel like exclaiming the mystery woman’s identity. Alas the silence he met Sophia with was enough of an answer. The wheels continuously turned inside her mind, so loud that Jake could’ve sworn that he could _actually_ hear it. 

Jake Peralta.  Good guy.  No scandalous past or track record.  Drinks.  “Someone from work.”  Flinch.   
There must be feeling involved. She knows her. 

_“Someone from work,” _Sophia repeated out loud as to speed up the answer coming to her. It was all one big mess in her head but somehow comes together forming a perfectly clear answer. 

“Amy… " she tasted the name on her tongue trying to find the second half of it. Amy Santiago? The girl you used to work with back at the Nine-Nine.” 

Another silence; another answer; another soundless _yes_. Suddenly Jake wished he’d never told Sophia about Amy. The two women had never met, but of course Jake couldn’t enter a relationship without bringing home a lot of shop talk, which involved anecdotes and pictures about his squad: ex-partner Santiago who’d by then moved on to work with Major Crimes included

“I can’t believe you went out and screwed an old colleague while I sat at home like the good, naive wife-to-be!” She cursed loudly after having gotten over the big blow of the mistress’ reveal. Jake flinched having no defence as he knew very well that he deserved the rough treatment. What he’d done to her was inconsolable and unforgivable. 

“Fuck you, Jake,” her eyes and words were equally life-draining as they dug into him like daggers. “Fuck you for being with me, fuck you for telling me you loved me, for you for building a life with me, fuck you for proposing and the biggest of all fuck yous for almost leading me into a what was already a dead-end marriage.” 

By then, having already threatened moments ago but had only actually fallen in the midst of her last outburst, tears were falling on her cheeks. 

“I deserve every single ‘fuck you’ you have to offer and I’m so sorry, Sophia. Really, I truly deeply am and, not that it matters now, but I did love you and still do… It’s just-“

“I’m not her,” she finished his sentence for her making it much simpler than whatever long, intricate explanation he would end up forming. And she suddenly looked very calm; upsettingly calm and settled even. 

Jake froze. He knew he was thinking it but didn’t exactly expect Sophia to catch up on it so fast. 

“You might be the world’s worst person to me right now, and I’m not about to forgive it…” Her eyes for the first time tonight, through the tears, showed a sign of sadness, regret even, rather than anger like she’d come to realise something. “… But I also know that you’re a man who does love and probably did love me, even though it doesn’t feel like it right now, which is also why I know you would never do this to me if there wasn’t someone you…” she halted as if the words didn’t want to come out of her. “… if there wasn’t someone you loved even more, and I don’t want to be with you if there’s someone out there you love more than me. I don’t want to waste my life being someone’s number two: I jut wish you’d told me earlier… Or simply in a way that didn’t include screwing around.” 

Jake had never considered the fact that perhaps he had what resembled love for Amy, but hearing Sophia somehow explain his mess to him though she was the victim, it suddenly seemed more clear and obvious than ever before. 

“You’re worth much more than I can offer you, Sophia… And I’m sorry I didn’t communicate that properly.”

“Well…” his almost-wife had seemed to calm down although the clenching feeling in his gut, guilt, would surely stick around for some time. “Just make sure to at least offer that Amy something equal her worth. Don’t be an idiot twice.” 

Jake nodded trying to change it all in; the switch in tone and mood, all the new facts hitting him harder than a storm. 

“Did she know?” Sophia quizzed again after a moment of silence.

“What?”

“That you had me?That you were engaged?”

“Oh, uh…” Jake frowned hating that he knew the answer. Even though it didn’t matter he didn’t want what she did that night to represent Amy. But he couldn’t lie. Not anymore. “Yeah, I think… I believe I mentioned it.” 

“Well,” Sophia took a moment to compose herself, grabbing the door as to get ready to close it. “Then perhaps you’re already offering her something equal to her worth.” 

Between the confessing to Sophia and trying to win Amy back (is it ‘back’ if he never _really_ had her?) Jake’s having a week from hell, and it very quickly turns out that talking to Sophia very surprisingly comes down to being the easiest task of the two. 

It was a dark evening with clouds assembling threatening to spill rain and thunder covering the sky. Perhaps the weather knew how he felt; hopeless, somber, alone. After obviously not being able to stay in his and Sophia’s apartment anymore he’d offered to take the high road and move out - or at least move himself out along with a bag of clothes and bare necessities. The rest of his stuff would come around once he’d found a new place to call his own.  Until then he crashed at Charles’ which both he, Genevieve and _especially_ nephew Nikolaj immensely enjoyed. Although he seemed not as happy and joking as usual, Nikolaj noticed, there was nothing better than spending evenings playing with his priceless collection of trucks and uncle Jake who always impressed him with conniving truck-sounds. 

But as soon as the darkness and the moon reigned over New York, when Niko and his parents were fast asleep and the apartment was dead silent, Jake was left to himself in the guest room to ponder endlessly and hating himself so much more. At least during the day he could repress and distract himself from these thoughts and feelings. 

The end of him and Amy, though he barely even knew what _that_ meant anymore, suddenly seemed inevitable. Turned out that getting back in contact with a person whose trust you’d lost was harder than one would think - especially when you were obsessed, dying to be with said person, and she wouldn’t answer any calls, texts or voicemails which would allow you to explain. 

Jake experienced this first hand as he dialled her number only to be met with her by now all too familiar voicemail. 

“Ames, it’s me for the…” he took a brief glance at his phone immediately feeling slightly embarrassed by the sight of call list. “… 4th time today (20th time this week). Please, I’m _begging_ you, pick up. I talked to Sophia and I’m-“ he searched his mind for the perfect words to say but they seemed so far gone, used up and meaningless by now. It already felt like he’d tried every way of wording possible to explain his renewed, honest intentions. 

A deep sigh filled the pause before he preceded, slowly feeling himself slipping and giving up. “I miss you. I never meant to hurt you, and I know nothing will undo that I in fact did but please let me explain. I’m at Charles’. I’m staying here until I can find a new place to live and, yeah, Sophia is no longer in the picture. It’s just you, Amy. I just want you. Please call me back - or even just a text would be good too.”

He hung up before putting down his phone and turning over to lie sleeplessly, one more night to add to the list, in his lonely borrowed bed. 

To no one’s surprise, least of all Jake’s, this declaration and plead number 20 wasn’t the one to convince Amy of giving him the time of day either. There was no way over, under or around the fact that she simply didn’t want to hear from him, and even less let him hear anything back. Though he was dying to explain himself, wanting nothing more than run to her apartment and kick down her door, tell her he wanted her,he also knew that wasn’t the way things worked. Maybe in movies but not in real life with real people, real feelings and real consequences. 

No matter how badly he needed and missed her he respected her wishes, which seemingly was not seeing him. Giving up on her felt wrong, unreal and excruciating when just five days ago he’d been lying in bed with her in his arms in the warm morning sunlight. And though he wasn’t officially about to back down and give in to the screwed up circumstances that had gotten them here, there sure wasn’t much motivation left in him but one thing: Amy.

Seeing Amy. Talking to Amy. Apologising to Amy. Admiring Amy. Touching Amy. Loving Amy, someday when that word seemed rational. Anything with Amy, he wanted it and would go to great lengths to earn it.

That, all that, he hoped, would be enough to mend them again someday hopefully soon. 


End file.
